Picture the scene. You and your friends have just secured the Sunday League title on the final day of the season, completing a brilliant double after winning the national cup the previous week. You scored the winning goal in that cup final, by the way, and a few weeks before that, you scored a hat-trick at Wembley as your Saturday team won the FA Vase, live on national television.
It’s been the best few months of your life, to be honest, but you won’t be celebrating it. You can’t.
Because on Monday, everything is changing. On Monday, you say goodbye to the Sunday League and goodbye to your nine-to-five job. On Monday, your new life as a professional footballer begins.
A year ago, Elliott Nevitt found himself in exactly that situation, and it’s fair to say he hasn’t looked back since.
Until now, that is, when the Tranmere Rovers striker sits down with GOAL to reflect on his first year as a Football League player.
“I wouldn’t change a thing,” Nevitt says. “I’m doing something I never thought I’d do. I’m living my dream.”
His first season as a professional could not be described as anything other than a success. Having shone for Campfield FC in the ultra-competitive Liverpool Sunday League, and having made a big impact with Warrington Rylands in the eighth tier of the English pyramid, Nevitt has handled the step up to full-time football in impressive fashion.
He played 45 times for Tranmere in all competitions last season, including 40 appearances in League Two. He finished as the club’s top scorer, and was named player of the year by both his team-mates and supporters.
“I owe Tranmere everything,” he says. “They’ve given me so much. They made my dream come true.
“The fans have made me one of their favourites, and that means so much. I think they see me as one of them; I work hard, I never cheat and I’ll do anything to win.”
Nevitt’s story is certainly an unusual one for a professional. He is 25 now, but was never on a league club’s books as a youngster. He spent time at the Steven Gerrard Academy as a teenager, and flirted with the idea of a playing career in the USA’s Premier Development League (now the USL League Two).
Sunday League football, though, became his be-all and end-all. Nevitt played for Campfield, one of Merseyside’s most successful amateur teams, while working full-time on the production line at the Jaguar Land Rover factory.
“Shift work,” he recalls, grimacing. “One week 6am until 2pm, then 2pm until 10pm, and then 10pm until 6am.
“Four years I did it. I could never go back to it. Those night shifts are the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”
Mind you, his first pre-season at Tranmere must run it close?
“That was tough, mate,” he says. “I thought I’d go in flying because I’d been playing right through the summer for the Campy.
“But wow, those first sessions! They were like machines. I couldn’t keep up with them. It was like a different world.”
Nevitt’s first game for Tranmere, ironically, was against Gerrard’s Rangers at Prenton Park.
“Yeah, that was mad,” he says. “I’m a Liverpool fan, and after the game Stevie came up to me and said 'Well done, you’re doing amazing, keep going.'
"Him and [coach] Tom Culshaw asked if they could get a picture with me, so they could send it to the guys at the academy. Unreal!”
Nevitt settled in well at Tranmere, bonding particularly with the likes of Callum McManaman, Jay Spearing and Nicky Maynard, but he learned quickly that fitness would be key if he was to take his big chance.
He weighed 94 kilograms when he arrived at Prenton Park, but soon set about changing that.
“I trained so hard,” he says. “I worked non-stop with Andy Hodgen, the fitness coach, and the club’s nutritionist gave me a plan to follow. I never strayed away from it for six months.
“They’d measure me every three weeks and I could see and feel the difference every time. I became a bit obsessed, to be honest!
“The club wanted me to get down to 88 kilos, but I ended up getting down to 80 inside six months. The difference it’s made to me is massive. This pre-season, I was at the front of the running. I feel sharper, leaner, stronger, so much better.”
It’s clear from speaking to Nevitt that he has the bit between his teeth this season. Eight goals may have been a respectable return for his debut campaign, but he’s setting his sights a lot higher this time around.
“I’d love to score 20 goals or more,” he says. “Last season was about learning, but this year I need to do more, I need to smash it. I want numbers.
“I’m not a kid now, I’m 25, it’s time to produce. I need to score goals, and we need to get promoted to League One. That's what this club wants and what the fans deserve.”
Tranmere love him, as evidenced by the fact they extended his contract within four months of him signing, and having narrowly missed out on the play-offs last season, Mickey Mellon’s side will again be among the favourites for promotion this time.
As for himself, how does he see the story panning out? The sky is the limit, surely?
Does Nevitt look, maybe, at someone like Jamie Vardy, or perhaps Rickie Lambert, as an example of what a latecomer to the professional game can do, given a break and a lot of hard work?
“One hundred percent,” he says. “They’re inspirations, especially someone like Lambert. He was a Liverpool fan who ended up playing for Liverpool. It doesn’t get any better, does it? Imagine! I don’t know what I’d do if I ever got that call.
“Vardy’s 35 and still doing it. He’s won the Premier League, Golden Boot, and he’s as sharp now as ever. He’s unbelievable, looks like he could still play another 10 years. He must work so hard. How can that not inspire you?
“If I have half the career those lads have had, I’d be so happy. They’ve done something I’d never think of. But I never thought I’d even get here, so why not? I’m just going to try and work hard and if it doesn’t happen, then at least I’ve done everything I could.
“I said to my mates last summer ‘This could be my only chance’. And after a few weeks I was like ‘I want to do this forever.'
“I know I can handle it now. It took me six months to adjust and get used to it all, but I’m there now. This is a once in a lifetime chance, and I don’t want to let it go.”
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