Jack Byrne's turbulent time at Oldham Athletic has come to an end, as the young Irish midfielder has had his contract terminated. He has since completed a move to Scottish side Kilmarnock.
Oldham released a very brief statement last night confirming the news:
Oldham Athletic and Jack Byrne have mutually agreed to terminate his contract.
The 22-year-old attacking midfielder initially joined the club on loan in August 2017 before signing permanently in January 2018, making 44 appearances and scoring eight goals in all competitions.
The club would like to wish Jack luck for the future.
Byrne joined Oldham permanently in January after a relatively successful loan spell, but soon found himself frozen out of the squad. Byrne was uninvolved in all of the club's matchday squads this season. On social media, Byrne had been critical of elements of how the club is run, but there was no official explanation as to why he had been ostracised.
The club has been engulfed in turmoil since relegation to League Two last season.
Club captain Anthony Gerrard was sacked after arguing with fans on Twitter and immediately signed a deal to join Carlisle. Meanwhile, former League of Ireland Player of the Year Patrick McEleney left the club six months after joining to return to Dundalk and was highly critical of the hierarchy in an interview with the Herald:
People think the grass is always greener and everything is better away from home but it’s not, that wasn’t a step-up for me and I wouldn’t advise someone else to do what I did... It just didn’t work, it was a weird club, it was run different to anything I’d seen before, not paying players on time or just deciding when to pay players.
As Byrne was frozen out, Oldham fans online launched a campaign called #FreeJackByrne.
Now that Byrne has left the club, fans voiced their anger.
When we said free jack byrne. This isnt what we meant
— Tom Butterworth (@tom_db) August 31, 2018
Some clubs deserve to fail and sadly OAFC are one of them.Jack is well off away from such a club.
— Peter Fitzpatrick (@peterfitz17) August 31, 2018
