The lineup invited up on stage carried considerable clout. The Premier Sports Network offered a platform to figures as wide-ranging as the former England midfielder Ryan Mason, on coping with premature retirement, to Mauricio Sulaiman, the president of the World Boxing Council. Jermaine Pennant and David Cotterill spoke eloquently about careers touched by controversy and depression, while Nicky Butt, Manchester United’s academy manager, talked of Sir Alex Ferguson “the forward thinker” and addressed the pressures placed on the next generation.

Yet it was arguably the make-up of the audience, crammed into the ballroom at the Corinthia hotel on London’s embankment, which demonstrated sport’s increasing commitment to off-field player welfare. There were representatives of 17 top-flight clubs and 25 from further down the pyramid, alongside administrative figures from the Football Association and Johan Cruyff Institute, Premier League and RFU, NFL and Premiership Rugby.

There were members of the hierarchy from Paris Saint-Germain to Internazionale, Valencia to Vancouver Whitecaps, and around 20 major agencies across sports from football to golf, all recognising a duty of care over player education or mental well-being. “Looking around the room and seeing the interest here, it is encouraging,” said Sonny Pike, who was signed by Ajax at the age of seven and compared to Diego Maradona at 14, only to crumple under the pressure of expectation and abandon the sport at 16. He drives a black cab. “A few years ago, this would not have happened. And that suggests some kind of progress is being made.”

The event, expertly hosted by Sky Sports News’s Adam Leventhal, was the brainchild of Spencer Hidge and David Bull, sponsorship and commercial consultants, with the former overseeing PSN’s startling growth. The inaugural International Player Care conference attracted around 30 people in 2015. Word of mouth ensured Monday’s seventh edition drew a capacity audience of 300. There was an inevitable lean towards football given the nature of the audience and the hush reflected the level of engagement in the testimonies delivered by those on stage.

Cotterill, a former Wales winger who retired at 30, addressed his struggles with alcohol and bemoaned some agents and even parents viewing young players merely as an opportunity to make money. He cited a 15-year-old at a Premier League club’s academy who had apparently been paid £250,000 to sign up with an agency. Pennant, alongside him, reflected upon his upbringing on the notorious Meadows estate in Nottingham and scoring a hat-trick on his first Premier League start for Arsenal while still half-cut from the night before. He made no attempt to glorify those antics. These were warnings as to the pitfalls in the professional game. “People say I underachieved,” he said. “But coming from where I came from, and with the mistakes I made, I overachieved.”

Who helps players deal with emptiness and uncertainty when what they aspired to become is taken away? Spencer Hidge

Drewe Broughton, a veteran of 22 clubs across a 17-year career, pleaded for more to be done to tap into players’ emotional needs but described football as a “corrupt industry, like the Wild West” in terms of the money thrown at younger talent. Christophe Henrotay, Thibaut Courtois’ agent, backed up that assessment. Hal Robson-Kanu went as far as to call for a complete restructuring of the sport after the “critical error” which saw Fifa reform its player agents system in 2015, with the West Bromwich Albion and Wales forward calling for re-regulation to ensure agents are properly accredited and experienced.

An emotional Jeff Mostyn, chairman of Bournemouth, choked back tears as he recalled how the club had supported Harry Arter and the midfielder’s fiancee, Rachel, after the devastating loss of the couple’s stillborn daughter. “That day we had 25 player liaison officers in the dressing room,” Mostyn said. “The players united behind Harry.” An audience eager to broaden horizons soaked it all up.

Hidge, whose football career extended to semi-professional level with Corinthian Casuals in south-west London, is not out to rival bodies such as the Professional Footballers’ Association or to shame any sport’s efforts to address the wide-ranging issue of player welfare. Rather, PSN is offering all-comers a platform to learn from each other. “It’s an opportunity for people within different sports to meet and talk about issues which haven’t always been discussed openly, and let them share ideas,” he said. “We bring sports together so key figures can network, compare the latest techniques or ideas, driving awareness with people directly attached to players.

“We look at everything from academy level – from education to financial management, dealing with the media or even with rejection – to the seniors on issues such as mental health, coping with long-term injuries, or simply life in the limelight. If a player is struggling, let’s ask why they are struggling. Care for players off the pitch is part of the largest clubs’ competitive advantage. But we also have people in to talk about the transition out of sports, whether at a young age if a player does not land that scholarship, to how they attack life after a lengthy career. Who helps them deal with that emptiness and uncertainty when what they aspired to become, or even enjoyed for such a long time, is taken away? What happens next?”

That issue has drawn the focus of late, with thousands of youngsters released by academies across professional sports every year. There are more than 12,000 boys housed within football’s development system, the vast majority of whom never make it to senior level. Hidge, who played at the Providence House youth club on the back of Clapham’s Winstanley estate, witnessed friends “fall off the wagon” when dreams of turning professional came to nothing.

“That hyper-competitive environment can be brutal,” he said. “When things do not work out, they can feel lost when dumped back in real life. I am hugely sympathetic with clubs, some of whose academies have grown to be the size of large schools. But there is a recognition now that more can always be done, that the duty of care extends further.”

The fact his event is so well visited, whether by clubs or agencies wanting to develop a welfare aspect to their business, is an indication people recognise that much these days and are receptive to new ideas. “Our job within the sport is to be with young boxers before, during and after their ‘days of glory’,” Sulaiman said. That message echoed across all the sports represented at the Corinthia.