The day I lost my pace was the first time I realised I was officially getting older.

I was helping a friend out, playing football for his team in Kew. Asked what position I played, I mumbled something about being a defender, and was allocated a place in the centre of defence. This was fine with me – I had played there before for various Sunday league teams.

Even in my late twenties, I still had a decent turn of pace. Hardly Olympic 100 metre final levels, but enough to get me out of any self-induced trouble. Coupled with a solid enough understanding of the game, I could easily be described as, at my best, competent.

It was a glorious Summer afternoon, as I kitted out for my Kew debut, a pre-season friendly against a team now wiped from my memory banks. In the days before zonal marking became a thing, I was tasked with marking the opposition centre-forward, a slight youthful looking player. I am a fairly affable person, and like to engage with my fellow competitor, cultivating a good working relationship with them. Not today – a sullenness exuded from every pore, unwilling to engage with my friendly banter.

About twenty minutes into the game, it happened. A long, aimless punt forward sailed over my head into the no-mans land between the centre circle and our goalkeeper. I turned, and chased after it, like an excitable terrier going to retrieve the ball for my owner, an action I had completed hundreds of times before. I was vaguely aware of a presence behind me as I turned, but thought nothing of it as I headed towards the ball.

In a matter of seconds, but felt like decades, my surly adversary had caught up with, and them surpassed me. The hopefully thumped ball forward to nobody in particular had suddenly turned into a perfectly-weighted, Johan Cruyff-like ball in behind the defence. My internal emergency response plan activated, and as had also happened hundreds of times before, I pressed the “fast” mode in my feet. Except, when I put my foot to the pedal, there was nothing there, no burst of Sonic-like acceleration. The player was, if anything, getting further away. As he steadied himself before slotting the ball beyond our keeper to open the scoring, the realisation hit me: my pace had gone. My own solid attribute, the thing I could rely on most when all other parts of my game had failed, was no longer there. I was no longer young, that baton passed immediately to my fleet-footed opponent, now smiling and enjoying himself for the first time.

I retired from football at full-time, and haven’t played competitively since.