As a footballer, I’m elderly not elite, meaning that I’m one of 60,000 or so 50- to 92-year-olds (yep, 92!) in England who enjoy a more pedestrian version of the sport than the Premier League’s whippersnappers.
A survey last year revealed that for many of us ‘walking footballers’, the sport is our most significant social interaction of the week. So while the Premier League continued through the winter, I was — to use footballer lingo — sick as a parrot when we somewhat older, rather slower players were red-carded by the government. Conversely, I was over the moon at the end of last month when we were allowed to return to the pitch.
The walking game precludes running (the clue’s in the name) or play above head height. John Croot, director of the Walking Football Association, claims to have invented the game in 2011.
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