“Has anyone got a pump?”

“Who’s got the kit?”

“Has anyone seen the ref?”

“Where the fuck is Hamish?”

I’ve heard those four sentences every Saturday during the amateur football season for the last 16 years. To be fair, it’s not always Hamish who’s somehow ended up in Turkey Street rather than Winchmore Hill, but it usually is. Every side has a Hamish. No matter how many times you announce on the WhatsApp group to meet an hour before kick-off, no matter how many urgent messages you send – “better leave early, it’s a replacement bus service” … “Changing room 3” … “PITCH 4, WE’VE TAKEN THE KIT OUT” – you know he’ll be there, ambling slowly towards the pitch with all the time in the world, his boots in a plastic bag as the referee is doing the toss.

But it doesn’t matter. Because he’s good. And good players can turn up when they like.

As the traditional lineup of Europe’s finest – rogue states, oligarchs and energy drinks companies – began their quest for glory in the Champions League this week, it’s sometimes hard to remember that the hundreds of thousands of us who will turn out over the weekend are playing the same game.

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For years I have suggested professionals of all sports should have to endure amateur conditions just once. A Ronnie O’Sullivan 147 would be even more impressive if one cushion was two feet from the wall and he had to contort his cue at right angles above his head. Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal should have one tin of tennis balls, including a grey one that doesn’t bounce, and keep playing until all of them are in the net or over on Court 2. Who doesn’t want to see Rory McIlroy carry his own clubs and reach into his bag for a tee only to pull out a banana that’s been there since the last time it was sunny?

And professional footballers should have to put up the goal nets, play in a shrunken tumble-dried kit and deal with three players dropping out on a Saturday morning.

The job of trying to get 14 adults to the same place at the same time once a week sounds straightforward. In reality, it’s the single most difficult task many of us will ever undertake.

I dread looking at my phone on a Saturday morning. Science decided last year that the anticipation of receiving a text message gives you a hit of dopamine. It’s addictive. We are now conditioned to look forward to the flash and buzz of an incoming WhatsApp.

But there’s no dopamine on a Saturday. Instead, there’s Scott. His motorbike is broken and his grandad’s van is in the garage. I have four hours to find a goalkeeper. I check Kyle’s WhatsApp. Last seen at 3.45am. He won’t last 20 minutes.

Recruitment is now a 24/7 job – thousands of amateur Marcel Brands – wandering the streets, trying to find anyone with some Puma Kings. It works sometimes – I found a goalkeeper who’d come through the ranks with Joe Hart at Shrewsbury while I was cooking a pork schnitzel for Lynda Bellingham on the set of a Channel 4 food show.

One Friday last season I was hosting a Guardian Football Weekly live event in Hackney. I had only nine men for the trip to Alexandra Park the following day. While the show mattered – I needed players.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Putting up the goal nets - a job that professional players never have to do. Photograph: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images

I took to the stage and explained my situation. Would anyone like a game? £12. You’d need red socks and black shorts. Five hands shot up.

Flippantly, I asked if anyone from Alexandra Park was in the audience. Another hand. “I’m the club secretary.” This was unfortunate. But after a few frantic emails all the registrations were sorted by our own secretary Barry – seemingly on hand any hour of the day to help guide players through the ridiculous number of FA hoops needed before. There are thousands of Barrys up and down the country keeping this sport alive.

The game took place on Donkey Lane – a wide expanse of land with one of those Sunday league microclimates that turns even the lightest breeze into a force 10 gale.

We had what you’d call a five-goal wind in the first half. Goal kicks sailing into the sky and blowing out for a corner, the spindlier players barely able to stand. It felt more like an expedition to that big queue on Everest. 3-2 up at the break, we kept it to that in the second half – one which I’d played no role in, aside from hiding under coats on the touchline.

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Every Saturday is now an existential crisis. One ACL hangs on by a thread, hidden behind the failing placebo of a ragged neoprene support. The ankle below it gave way under no pressure in pre-season. When I am “fit” I spend the game running after people half my age, questioning my worth with every desperate tackle – players are so much quicker now, I can’t even foul them.

Every year, there are reports of numbers dropping, of pitches being unusable, of violence against refs and players, of more teams dropping out of the leagues mid-season. It’s getting more expensive. Solutions rarely get past unworkable attempts to filter money from the top of the game to the grassroots. Quite why Kevin De Bruyne should pay my £150 subs I don’t know.

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You can’t force people to play, but there have to be ways to make it easier, more affordable and more accessible for anyone who’s keen. I genuinely don’t know what I’d do without it.

The tireless cliches – “first and second”, “don’t let it bounce”, “they don’t want it”, “still 0-0”.

The smell of Deep Heat, the devastation when the showers are cold in Gunnersbury Park, the opposition centre-back reeking of booze, throwing up on the touchline and blaming it on a “tight collar”, that (increasingly rare) feeling of scoring a goal – there is no better.

So good luck to anyone who’s trying to find their shin pads on Friday evening – one is normally down the side of the washing machine. Try and be on time. And don’t text your skipper at midnight saying you’re not going to make it.