Saving Macclesfield is hardest thing I've done but it's my proudest achievement in football
ROBBIE SAVAGE is director of football at non-league Macclesfield FC and has done everything to help out at the club from cleaning glasses, to dealing with the police, and venting in the dressing room at half time
I played professional football for 21 years, captained four clubs in the Premier League and won 39 caps for my country.
In that time, I experienced every possible emotion – tears, joy, euphoria, heartache.
But helping to raise a football club from the ashes, and running it as director of football operations, is the hardest thing I've ever done by a million miles.
The documentary on BBC iPlayer Robbie Savage: Making Macclesfield FC – is not a hard-luck story like the fly-on-the-wall series that followed Graham Taylor's ill-fated spell as England manager.
It's about giving a community its football club back, and providing the best possible facility they could wish for.
We've been called a Poundland Salford City on Twitter, and there have been snipers saying it's all about money – which is completely untrue.
What we have done is to restore a focal point to an area which was taken away when Macclesfield Town was liquidated. Bust. Extinct.
When my business partner Rob Smethurst rang me up and said he wanted to rebuild the club as Macclesfield FC, and to bring me on board as his director of football operations, I thought he was mad.
There was no team, no manager, no income, the ground was in a shocking state and I didn't have a clue about what went into the administration of a football club.
Over the last 12 months, I've found myself cleaning glasses in the bar, planting corner flags on matchday, dealing with the police, health and safety, fire brigade... people you never meet ordinarily as a rank-and-file player.
I've been to watch more games, scouting for talent, than I've watched on TV. I've been to more meetings in a year than I've attended in the rest of my life put together.
I've found myself dredging emotions I never expected to release – whether it's running down to the touchline from my seat in the stand to berate a player, or letting off steam in the dressing room at half-time.
I've even found myself charging across the pitch to break up brawling fans – something you don't expect to see in the North West Counties League.
By the opening day of the season, and the reborn Macclesfield FC's first home game at the Leasing.com stadium, the transformation was incredible: The 4G pitch, the bar, the gym, the offices... the emotions were incredible. felt as nervous, but as proud, as the day I made my debut for Wales.
And we now have 600 players on the books, from first team down to primary school kids at grass roots level, in a culture where nobody is considered better than anyone else.
- 12:59, 5 Nov 2021UPDATED15:19, 5 Nov 2021