Cretaro signs new Sligo Rovers deal
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Sligo Rovers have announced that Raffaele Cretaro has signed a new deal for the 2013 season.
He becomes Ian Baraclough’s 14th signing for next season. The Tubbercurry native first joined Sligo Rovers in 2000, and remained there until 2006 when he spent one year with Galway United. He returned to Sligo Rovers in 2007, and stayed there until moving to Bohemians in 2010. He re-signed for the Bit o’Red in 2011 and played a huge part in winning the league.
The 31-year-old has made 360 appearances for Rovers in his career, scoring 62 goals.
Cretaro said: “I’m delighted to get things sorted and look ahead to the new season. It can take time and it is nice to complete the deal. It is a great challenge for the club to keep on improving given what we’ve done in the past few seasons. It’s an exciting one and I can’t wait to get started again.
“To have 14 players signed up already, when in some of the previous seasons it has been done with just a few weeks to the start of the season, is quite good and it’ll be interesting now to see how Ian finishes things off. It shows it will be just as competitive in the squad as last season. I finished the year with five goals in six games and if I can achieve anything like that over 2013 it’d be brilliant.
“At the moment some of the players and I are in the gym three or four times a week and working extremely hard ahead of pre-season, it is a bit different to what it was like for players a few years ago. You want to be in the best shape possible and be ready for January to get going. I feel it is important to be right and not be catching up at any stage.
“I felt I hit the ground running in January and February until I broke my hand just before that first game. It obviously affected my fitness, Danny North came into the side and started scoring and it look a while for me to get to full flight again. In the end it came right and I’d like to improve on the nine or 10 goals from 2012.
“Last season will soon be, if not already is forgotten. It is all about working on what we can do in 2013 and the hard work starts from here.”
