For Sinan Bytyqi, things were going well.

The Manchester City starlet, who fled war torn Kosovo with his parents as a baby, was winning rave reviews during a loan spell in Holland.

During his last visit to Manchester, Pep Guardiola had pulled the then 21-year-old aside for a discreet word, wishing him luck and telling him his progress with Go Ahead Eagles was being monitored closely.

Manchester City's Sinan Bytyqi had to retire after being diagnosed with a heart condition

Bytyqi walks to a training session with the first-team alongside ex-City man Kelechi Iheanacho

On the streets of his home village, many proudly strolled around in City gear, and followed his progress religiously.

But then it all changed.

After being named in the Eredivisie team of the week, and with thoughts already on returning to City to try and make the breakthrough into the first team, Bytyqi was called into the office of the Dutch club before training.

'I went in and there was the manager, the coaches, the physios,' he recalls. 'I thought "what's going on here?". It was weird. The manager pulled out a piece of paper and told me that they had found something on my annual heart monitoring test in Manchester and I had to go back to England.

'He also said it is the kind of condition that stops you from playing professional sport.'

While impressing during a loan spell, Bytyqi was diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy

That devastating sentence was delivered late last year. A second, hastily arranged opinion, in London, confirmed the diagnosis.

Bytyqi had hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a disease in which a portion of the heart muscle is enlarged, creating functional impairment of the heart. It is also the leading cause of sudden cardiac death in young athletes.

'They said if I continued playing I would have a four per cent chance of my heart stopping and that if I stopped, that would be one per cent,' he remembers, matter-of-factly.

It seemed like a cruel end to a journey that was not without sacrifices. As a six-month old Bytyqi, a Kosovan Albanian, escaped his homeland in his mother's arms with his father and his brother only to be sent back as they did not have the correct papers.

The 22-year-old has had a tough life - he had to flee Kosovo with his family while he was a baby

'I guess we were kind of illegals,' he says. 'The police sent us back. It was a bad time. I speak to my grandmothers and they say they hid in the forest and when they came back everything was destroyed. We eventually got the right papers and we ended up in Austria.'

Bytyqi showed talent with the ball and took the brave step of moving from picturesque Klagenfurt to big city Vienna at the age of 14, leaving behind a family that had now expanded to two brothers and three sisters, to pursue his dream.

'All I ever wanted to do was play football,' he recalls. 'It was tough, being three hours from home, but if you want something you have to sacrifice things.'

Bytyqi was playing for Austria's Under 19s when he was scouted by City, who made their move, and he was on his travels again. After a shaky start, and following the arrival of Patrick Vieira as coach of City's Elite Development Squad, he blossomed.

He joined City after impressing for Poland's Under 19s and played well for their youth teams

'Patrick was unbelievable,' he says. 'It was tough when I first got here but he made a massive difference. Little things. He saw some players waiting for a taxi once after training and took them home himself. When my family came over he took us all out for dinner to an Italian in town.'

That progress saw the attacking midfielder named as an unused substitute in City's 7-0 League Cup thrashing of Sheffield Wednesday in 2014. A first loan spell in Holland, at Cambuur, followed but was cut short by a knee injury which resulted in an eight-month lay-off.

After his recovery, he went Dutch again, to Go Ahead. 'It was a fantastic experience,' he says. 'We would get 10,000 sell-outs for home matches and you would play Ajax and there would be 50,000 there. I was back in Manchester and Pep came over to ask me how I was getting on. He told me they were watching me.'

Then came the bombshell. 'I've known since I was a child that there was something a little different,' he explains. 'But something like this only shows itself when you are fully grown.'

Bytyqi also spent time out on loan, twice moving to clubs in Holland to develop as a player

City, in particular director of football Txiki Begiristain, offered their full support as he went home to ponder his next step.

'Txiki said that they would not cut my contract and that they would stand by me whatever I decided,' he says. 'I felt so much responsibility. That I was letting people on Kosovo down. You do not get many football players there. If you went to my village you would see all my cousins in my old Manchester City clothes.'

But health came first. 'There are leagues which do not let you play with this condition,' Bytyqi explains. 'Italy, for example. In England it's down to the player, but what would I do if my club went away pre-season?

'And could I really play knowing that the guy on the sideline with the defibrillator is waiting for something to happen to me? That would not be nice.'

He had to make a decision over his future and chose to retire due to the condition

He made Begiristain aware of his decision: 'He said I made the right move. Then he asked me what I wanted to do and said they wanted to keep me at the club. He said if I wanted to open a shop at the stadium he would help me!'

Bytyqi contacted Fergal Harkin, City's scouting manager. 'He looked after me while I was on loan,' he says. 'He said he was going to build a team and I was welcome to work with him. I wanted to do that because I know how difficult a loan can be.

'At City you get everything, food, pool, sauna. You go out and you don't get that. You have to cook your own food. Even the language you don't understand.'

City, who have kept news of Bytyqi's playing retirement quiet until this interview, were as good as their word. On November 2, around a year after diagnosis, he started his new role as loan scout. 'I watch players, provide reports and try to support them,' he says.

Bytyqi speaks to Sportsmail reporter Mike Keegan about his new role as a loan scout at City

He made his debut at Bolton Wanderers v Norwich City, where he ran the rule over goalkeeper Angus Gunn. The following week he headed to Spain, to watch the City contingent at sister club Girona.

For a man who has been through as much as he has, Bytyqi is remarkably upbeat. I ask him how he manages to be that way.

'I can't change yesterday but I can change tomorrow,' he says. 'I go home and cry or I move on.'

He is grateful to City for their backing. 'Maybe two out of 10 clubs would keep you,' he says. 'I have to thank them for giving me a chance. For me the best job in the world is getting paid to play football and the second best is getting paid to watch it.'

He pauses, and then adds: 'I am very lucky.'