People think that footballers have it all: the luxury, the game, fans and fancy parties. But what people don’t see is how lonely life can become. Yeah, you have teammates, bantering in the dressing room, and group chats filled with memes and voice notes. But once the match, once you’re done training, the adrenaline wears off, and it’s just you. All alone in a rented apartment, nursing your sore feet with an ice pack and thinking about your next game, whether or not you are going to get picked.
There’s so much happening around us that we hardly have the time to realise where we’re going. Unless you’re on the top flight, you’re probably living far from home, constantly worrying about form fitness and contracts. I haven’t lived in the same city for more than two years. It’s hard to make friends outside football. Harder to date. What girl wants to deal with your weird schedule, the travel, and the emotional rollercoaster of wins and losses? Family? I call my mum every Sunday. She asks if I’m eating properly. I say yes. Sometimes, I lie.
And the kind of stress social media puts us through is terrible, which is why I deleted my Instagram a few months ago; it got too much. And now I’m watching old academy teammates living the dream in the Premier League while I’m grinding it out in League Two, trying to smile for club promo shoots and hoping my knee doesn’t flare up again before Saturday.
No, I dont hate all of this; I love it more than anything else; I chose this for myself. It takes more from you than you realise. You miss out on Sunday family dinners and cousins’ weddings, and a lot of things are put at stake here.
Somedays, I sit in the stands after training and stare at the pitch. It’s so quiet and peaceful. It reminds me why I want to keep going because when the whistle blows and I’m on the field, everything starts to make sense.
This isn’t some sob story; I’m just eternally grateful for this. I get to wear a shirt, represent a badge and call myself a professional. But between the goals and tackles, between the fixtures and finals, there’s silence, a lot of it. And there is waiting for the right time.
Most fans only see the beautiful 90 minutes: the celebrations, the heartbreaks. But football is much more than that. It’s our life in between those moments, the sacrifices, the solitude, and the quiet hope that that next game will be the one where everything changes.
Until then, we keep going. Always.