JASON De Vos is preparing to retire from football in the summer.Although the Ipswich Town skipper would love to carry on playing, he will quit the game rather than appear for anyone else if he is not offered a new deal at Portman Road.

JASON De Vos is preparing to retire from football in the summer.

Although the Ipswich Town skipper would love to carry on playing, he will quit the game rather than appear for anyone else if he is not offered a new deal at Portman Road.

De Vos has sold his East Bergholt home and has the opportunity to work in television back in his native Canada where he has built a lakeside home ready for his family to move into.

In the Blues centre half has also been highly critical of the Canadian footballing authorities and has made it clear that he would like to get involved in the politics of the game back home.

While the 34-year-old De Vos is wisely planning a future away from Ipswich Town, he is refusing to be distracted from the job in hand of winning promotion and the possibility of Jim Magilton handing him a new one-year contract

De Vos said: My intention has always been at the end of my playing career to return to Canada and pursue whatever opportunities present themselves to me and the media is something I'm keen to do in the future.

“At the moment, football is my job and it is my desire to win promotion. That is the goal we have set ourselves and if a run of form can materialise we can still go up automatically.

“It has been done in the past and there is no reason why we can't do that. We have to aim for12 victories otherwise you are settling for less than the best and I know the gaffer won't accept that no will I.”

Whatever happens in the summer De Vos is adamant that he will return home to Canada rather than play for another club outside the top-flight.

De Vos said: “I'm very happy at Ipswich and I have no desire to play for anyone else. I don't foresee myself playing for anyone other than Ipswich Town. The gaffer knows that and he knows I'm happy here.

“I know he values the contribution I make and I feel comfortable in saying I expect this to be my last football club because playing for anyone else would be a step down unless, improbably, I were to go to a Premiership club.”

Although De Vos needed a career-saving operation to enable a big toe joint to move freely last summer, he insists he has never been in better shape.

De Vos said: “Physically I feel better than I have ever done before. I have played virtually every game except the Portsmouth cup game which the gaffer and I decided, with the medical people, that I should have a rest.

He added: “I enjoy training as much now as I did when I was 18 because I know my days are not limitless. My ability to play the game at the standard I set myself is in proportion to my age to some extent. We can't carry on playing until 45 as much as we like to and the reality is we have to accept at some time we have to call it a day. The question is whether you wait to be pushed out the door or have your body give out on you or you make that decision on your own.”

Two Town players have been offered new contracts with Liam Trotter agreeing a one-year deal, while Chris Casement is mulling over the offer of another year at Portman Road.

derek.davis@archant.co.uk