Tom Rogic's early retirement to prioritize his family over his soccer career is inspiring people

The game of football requires a high level of dedication, discipline and training to perform well. Hence, it is demanding for many athletes. In such situations, it can become difficult for many to balance their personal lives and family with their football career. Sometimes, players have to take a call and prioritize one. Former Celtic and Australia midfielder Tom Rogic decided that his family is more important to him and announced his retirement on social media recently.

Rogic felt he needed to convey the reason for his retirement from the game and shared an elaborate post on his Instagram. The post is simply captioned "Retirement" and has received over 62K likes on the site. He starts his post by saying, "After careful consideration, I have made the decision to retire from professional football."

Rogic talks about how he has always preferred to keep his personal life private but felt prompted to share the reasoning for his retirement with all his fans. He reveals how he and his wife had been undergoing IVF treatments for many years to grow their family. Thankfully, the treatments worked and the couple were able to welcome a baby girl in 2021. He says, "I have loved every minute of being a dad and consider it my greatest achievement in life."

The couple continued trying and received wonderful news that they would be having twins in 2024. Now that he was going to be a father to a 2-year-old girl and twins, he felt that it was the right time to quit and divert all his attention to their family. His sporting career involved quite a bit of travel, so he shares that he has returned to Australia to prepare for the arrival of the twins. He then begins expressing his gratefulness to the Celtic Football Club, where he played for most of his career.

Rogic mentions how the club enabled him to play in front of 60,000 fans each week, win many trophies and give him exposure to European football. He then says, "I have also been lucky enough to represent my country with the Socceroos on over 50 occasions and experienced playing in major international tournaments." The Socceroos is the official nickname for the national Australian men's football team. He recalls how he could not have imagined finding so much success while he grew up in Australia.

The veteran then thanks his teammates for all their support over the last 12 years. He talks about how the entire experience was a "special journey" that gave him many "fond memories." Rogic mentions having formed numerous strong friendships over the years. He then expresses his gratefulness to Peter Lawwell and Dermot Desmond.

He writes, "Without their help, all of this would not have been possible. Through Peter and Dermot, I was put in direct contact with one of the world's leading medical experts, which eventually led to my wife and I being placed at the clinic that would give us the best chance possible to start a family." Rogic then went on to thank the managers he had worked with and his loyal fans.

Rogic concluded the post by saying he was looking forward to what the future held for him. Fellow footballers expressed their support for his decision in the comments section. @joehartofficial said, "Wicked player @tomrogic18. Enjoy retirement."