Liam Scales has blamed internal problems at Bristol Rovers as the reason why his summer transfer fell through.
The highly-rated UCD defender rejected Manchester City this summer in favour of first-team football and, after they fended off competition from Fleetwood Town, it appeared that the Gas had won the race to sign him.
Yet the deal for the 21-year-old dragged on and on, before Rovers boss Graham Coughlan said he was pulling the plug due to 'murky waters' in the transfer , blaming talk in the Irish press for the delay.
Scales has been called up for international duty with Ireland under-21s and, speaking to RTE, revealed that, as far as he was concerned, it was actually issues at Rovers that caused the deal to collapse.
He said: "I was in talks with Bristol Rovers.
"I was under the impression it was going to happen.
"Unfortunately there were issues on their side of it. I'd stopped playing for UCD to give myself a couple of weeks' break to go over and be fresh.
"In the couple of weeks I took off it fell through. It was completely out of my control. I couldn't have done anything differently.
"UCD couldn't have done anything differently. It was internal problems in Bristol Rovers that stopped it.
"It's in the past, it happens in football. Right now I'm not thinking about it.
"I suppose at the end of the season I'll have a month or so to see if anything comes up. If there's a possibility I'd love to take it.
"I'd love to go full-time. That's been my ambition. It's something I hope to do, either abroad or in Ireland."
