Finally...

Finally… my first post! One of my New Year’s Resolutions was to write in this blog at least twice every month. This was a promise of 2008 and 2009 after registering in Decemeber 2007(!) That must be a record in itself. Posting the first blog 15 months after joining and also during this time thinking repeatedly, today is the day I start blogging.

I started writing last night but only managed a few words as I was too tired, even though I was so inspired. Yesterday, I played my first proper game of football in five years (playing at Old Trafford in a staff tournament doesn’t count) and it just made me so happy and exhilarated and now I’m kicking myself for not taking it up earlier.

Had a knee op (cartilage meniscus) in April 2006 and then I was lazy and didn’t get on with the rehab. Going to uni was a ball but my biggest regret is always gonna be not joining the footy team. If I’d remembered the positive effect it has on me I would have.

I’ve played football ever since I could walk, just an average player, but my heart was always 120% in it. When moving to England in 2003 I first tried to join Manchester United so I went training with them at the Cliff (the old training ground of MAN U). Didn’t feel particularly welcomed in the team but then I had a trial with Man City which went really well so I signed for them straight away.

Went training a few times and got a couple of games but had to put that on the back burner as training finished at 10pm at Platt Lane, Moss Side. Waiting for the bus on my own in an area which gave Manchester the nickname ‘Gunchester’ and was also called the ‘Bronx of Manchester' didn’t seem too appealing.

When I was a kid and people asked me what I wanted do for a living, I always said, ‘I wanna be a professional footballer’. At the age of 15 I was on my way to a regional football college. My application for the National one in Sweden was rejected, obviously because I wasn’t good enough. And in the end, it proved too expensive to attend the regional one so the plans never materialised. Around this time, I came to my senses and realised I was never going to be a professional footballer so I set my sights on my second passion - journalism. And that’s the road I’m still on.