'Walking out at Old Trafford is what millions dream of' - How former Manchester United goalkeeper Paul Woolston is coping with retirement

The most moving moment during the half-an-hour in Paul Woolston's company is when he recalls the Manchester United doctor informing his mother her son would never play again.

Woolston's mam, as she is known by her North Shields-born son, and dad had to endure the sorrow of their son's retirement at the age of 23 after the upset of their daughter, Newcastle women's full-back Rachel, recovering from rupturing her anterior cruciate ligament. Rachel had sustained the same injury in her other knee two years earlier.

The mention of 'mam' is the only occasion where Woolston's voice trails off. He thought he had accepted the news he will never patrol a penalty area again due to a hip problem that required two lots of surgery until a BBC headline on Monday. The words 'Former Man Utd keeper' stopped Woolston in his tracks.

"I kind of had an inkling before the second op that this (retirement) was more than likely this was going to happen.," he says in the media room of the Jimmy Murphy Centre at United's Carrington training complex. "It was just before the end of April. They said there could be a chance, like a 1% chance (of success). Ninety-nine out of 100, you want to be that one, don't you? And I was like, if anyone can hopefully do it, it would be me.

"We knew, everyone around us at the club, this could be the way it might go, the dreaded news nobody wants to hear. When I first found out, luckily the doc was there, so I could block everything out, I didn't want to hear it.

"When the doc told me mam.... he kind of gave it the big script. I was just kind of dazed, I don't really want to listen to it. It was hard at the time accepting it, to actually go, is it not true? Is this what the picture looks like? It didn't settle for