I could play two, three games a week at a high level in Europe but in the A-League, I would lose up to four kilograms after games in heat and take days to recover.

Performances suffer but not as much as the wellbeing of players. It's not just the heat of the Australian of summer that takes it out of you but the rock hard fields at that time of year. We have to train on them every day and it takes a toll on players' joints, knees and their backs. As I learned, the older players feel it the most.

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My career was almost ended by a serious knee injury in 2011 that was caused by wear and tear. There wasn't a single factor or incident that caused the injury but the hard conditions in Australia might have accelerated the deterioration. If I had my time again, I would have managed my work loads and wellbeing differently. My attitude was always to train, train and train. The more I trained, the better I played. That was how we worked on the softer grounds and cold winters of Europe but I shouldn't have applied the same intensity daily in the A-League. In hindsight, I would have skipped a training session here and there because of my age and the hard pitches. I should have been smarter as a player.

Over seven years with the Socceroos, I played games in South America, North Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Europe. I experienced heat, humidity, harsh winters and altitude but the most difficult climate I've had to work in might well be the Australian summer. A one-off game in the humidity of South East Asia poses challenges but the weekly grind of playing and training in heat, on hard pitches and having to travel great distances frequently makes the A-League very, very difficult. You simply can't extract the same kind of performance out of yourself playing here in Australia compared to how you will play in Europe. The human body is not made for that. It’s like a car, if it overheats then it doesn’t perform as well.