Back in November 2013, Irish football entered a new era.
Martin O’Neill took over the reins as international manager with Manchester United and Ireland legend Roy Keane making up one of the most unlikely double-acts in European football.
The month remains a poignant one for Sean St Ledger, not because he was named in the new manager’s maiden international squad, but because of what happened 30-odd minutes into his first match of the new regime.
Playing his football at Leicester City at the time, and having missed a large chunk of the previous season on the treatment table, St Ledger suffered a reoccurrence of that knee injury.
And Ireland’s only goalscorer at the ill-fated Euro 2012 tournament has never fully recovered from that persistent problem.
"I was in the first squad and I got injured. I came off against Poland and that was kind of the start of all my injury problems. Between my groin and knee it's been never ending," St Ledger told RTE Sport.
The 37-times capped Ireland defender has barely kicked a ball in anger since as an unsuccessful short-term spell at Ipswich was followed up by a move Stateside where St Ledger lined out for Orlando City and most recently with the Colorado Rapids.
Things have not been right for St Ledger and the former Preston man admits that most people he meets thinks that he is retired from the game.
But at 32-years-old – still relatively young for an experienced centre-half – the Solihull-born Irishman harbours for one more spell in the paid ranks of the game that he loves.
"I've been in America so it's like everyone I see say 'oh, are you retired?'. And I'm, like, not officially no (laughs). So, yeah, I want to see how it goes and then at least I can say I've done everything I can to try and play and football again."
St Ledger has since set off on the road to recovery.
Having opted out of the time-consuming and not-so-successful meniscus transplant, which may have only afforded a 20 per cent chance of playing again with a year out of the game, St Ledger approached renowned expert and former Bayern Munich doctor, Hans-Wilhelm Muller-Wohlfahrt in search of an alternative.
"Basically what happened was I was in Colorado and my knee had kept swelling so we decided to have surgery," explained St Ledger.
"I had a little tear on my meniscus and loads of debris floating around. So that was that, a pretty normal procedure, nothing major.
"I tried to come back and train but my knee was just basically blowing up. It was hurting when I was kicking a ball.
"There was one other option; to go to Muller-Wohlfahrt.
"So that's the decision I made. I went in October and he has a guy there who has given me a rehab programme.
"He just did a simple test where I tried to jump over a hurdle with my right leg and I wasn't able to do it.
"And said, ‘well, if you can't do that, how do you expect to run?’ So he stripped me down from the beginning and, yeah, I've been jumping over hurdles a lot."
St Ledger now sees a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel and with those lingering thoughts of retirement put out of his head, for the time being at least, the Ireland defender is targeting a July return and a full pre-season with a new club.
"I've been going for five, six months now and I'm literally at the end of the rehab programme and so I'm hoping that in July if someone wants to take me, that I'm going to give it another bash.
"I'd just be thankful to play again, to be honest. It's been quite tough really, mentally, not being able to play.
"I just want to play football again because I've missed it so much and it's been such a good career, fantastic, and you don't want it to ever come to an end. And I've felt like it is. So if I can play somewhere...I just want to enjoy it again."
St Ledger is not ruling out signing for a League of Ireland club and admitted that he was approached by Sligo Rovers’ former manager Dave Robertson, however, the defender was in the early stages of rehab and had to decline the offer.
"When Dave Robertson was at Sligo, he rang me up about going there but I was literally just starting my rehab programme and it was the wrong timing more than anything. But I'm open to anything really."
And while St Ledger is not sure about what level he will return to the game, the prospect of once again pulling on the green of Ireland and walking out at the Aviva Stadium – coincidently where the interview took place – is a dream that is helping to fuel the long and arduous path back to playing competitive football.
"My dream is to come back here and play - or just to be involved in some way. This has probably given me the best moments of my career, without a shadow of a doubt.
"I’d give up everything to be able to walk out in this stadium."
Sean St Ledger was in Dublin to launch the FAI's partnership with Irish menswear brand Benetti.
