Sep 30 Leighton O'Brien Leaves Impact

The Montreal Impact announced Tuesday that American midfielder Leighton O’Brien, a 33-year-old veteran, had returned home to Tacoma, Washington for what was described as “personal reasons”. The Impact consequently released him from the club.

It would seem that O’Brien was not satisfied with the pitch time he was getting but at the same time, the Impact were not entirely satisfied with the conditioning O’Brien was in  since he joined the team merely weeks ago.

“Leighton was not playing a lot since his arrival in Montreal, so he decided to return to his family and his 10-month-old baby,” said Impact technical director Nick De Santis. “He did not show up in Montreal in excellent physical condition and it took him some time to get in shape. Unfortunately for him, we could count on a nearly healthy lineup, which meant that he was relegated to a substitute position, while he wanted to be a starter. He was a useful player for the team, but he didn't accept the role that we assigned him.”

After taking part in training camp with the Seattle Sounders of the MLS, O’Brien started the 2009 season with the Tacoma Tide in the USL Premier Development League club before the Impact signed him on August 7 for the remainder of the season. He earned one assist in seven matches with Montreal, including two as a starter (221 minutes of play).

Leighton’s brother Cieran, who is presently on loan to the Impact from the Colorado Rapids of the MLS and was off to a great start when he first joined the team, is one of the healthy bodies mentioned earlier and he has also seen his playing time extremely diminished.

Tags: 2009 \ Colorado Rapids \ MLS \ Montreal Impact \ quit \ released \ Seattle Sounders \ USL

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