LAST year at the grand final eve luncheon I sat down with my manager and great friend Craig Kelly to discuss my footballing future. Just seven days earlier Collingwood's 2007 season had ended at the hands of the all-conquering Geelong.

In that time I had wrestled with the many variables that the decision involved. My physical limitations, my state of mind, the club's chance of success, the club's well-being, the impact on family, the worst-case scenarios, the best-case scenarios.

That week hadn't made the decision any clearer to me.

At one point in the conversation I looked across the table at 'Ned' and said earnestly: "I still think I can play the game." To which the balding, 40-year-old man sitting across from me said, with a glint in his eye, "So do I."

It was at this moment that I realised my career was all but over.

Because in that moment I stopped looking at what I wanted to happen and started looking at what needed to happen. It was a shift in thought process that ultimately resulted in my retirement 10 days later.

Separating the dream from the reality was something beyond confronting. Every decision I'd made in my life to that point had been made with football in mind.

Being a better player, a better leader and a