I was so fully involved in football and building a career that I didn't spend nearly enough time with my son when he was growing up.

I'm always disappointed when we lose, and it's happened quite a few times.

I've got to that stage in my life where, difficult decisions I don't have to make, I push them into the future until such time I have to make them.

For goal-scorers and centre-forwards, confidence does play a big part.

We all have limitations. I don't have the right genes to be an Olympic weightlifter. I don't have the right genetics to be an Olympic sprinter. Or gymnast. Sure, if I trained my whole life, perhaps I could have become fairly decent in those sports.

Teach a child to play solitaire, and she'll be able to entertain herself when there's no one around. Teach her tennis, and she'll know what to do when she's on a court. But raise her to feel comfortable in nature, and the whole planet is her home.

I've grown up a lot, and I have such great memories of playing football.

Precisely at the moment when an athletic career is most on the line and fan perceptions of a Herculean, supra-human performance are highest, an athlete's brain may be at its most vulnerable.