Winning the Ballon d’Or never bothered me. I just wanted to play for Manchester United.

Yes I am finally hanging up my boots for good.

At every opportunity, I wanted to play football.

I am not a man of many words, but I can honestly say playing football is all I have ever wanted to do.

Nobody has ever had to go off following one of my tackles and nobody has broken their leg.

Get up. Go to work. Play the game. Get showered. Go home.

I am not ashamed to admit that in the games against Barcelona I spent a lot of the time just hoping he would take up positions as far away from me as possible. Elusive is the word that immediately springs to mind when I think about Messi's style of play. You think you have an eye on him and then - blink - he has gone, only to reappear somewhere else in space, with the ball.