Until last September, time was always Steph Houghton's friend. Every year brought new worlds to conquer and new horizons to glimpse. Every year brought new achievements and more respect from team-mates and opponents alike.
Sure, she had injuries and setbacks like every other footballer does but she brushed them aside and forged on and on. In 2014, as women's football began its surge towards the mainstream, she was named England captain at the age of 25. Her career soared and soared.
It is hard to think of many people in sport you would rather go into battle with than Houghton. There is something about her that exudes responsibility and indomitability. Her selflessness has made her popular with her team-mates. 'She has got a big heart,' says the England manager Phil Neville. 'The girls love her because they know she cares about the players.'
Every year brought new achievements for Steph Houghton and more respect from team-mates
Houghton sits in her England tracksuit in a quiet corner of the Football Association's training complex at St George's Park, where she is preparing for Tuesday's friendly against Spain in Swindon and smiles when she thinks about how far she has come since the days when she joined Sunderland Ladies as a 13-year-old.
She thinks back to the days when her dad used to drive her from their home in the old pit village of South Hetton in County Durham in their sky blue Peugeot 306 to training at Sunderland's Charlie Hurley Centre. The rest of the family had wanted the car to be red because they were Sunderland fans but her mum insisted on sky blue.
Aspiring female footballers had to pay to play in those days. Houghton's subs for the Sunderland Ladies' team were £250-a-year. 'That was a lot of money back then,' she says. They wore hand-me-downs from the men's team. Now, she watches young girls arriving at her club, Manchester City, in their own kit, not having to worry about finishing early because they can't afford to pay for floodlights.
In 2012, she played for Great Britain in the Olympics and scored the winner in the final group game against Brazil in front of more than 70,000 fans at Wembley. In 2015, she led England to the semi-finals of the World Cup in Canada. The team's slogan was 'Inspire a Generation' and they did it. More and more girls started to play the game.
In September 2017, she got engaged to Stephen Darby, the Bolton Wanderers and former Liverpool and Bradford City player. She announced the news with a post on Twitter.
As women's football began its surge towards the mainstream, she was named England captain
She has had injuries and setbacks like every other footballer does but has brushed them aside
'So yesterday I said yes,' she wrote. 'Can't wait to marry you and spend the rest of my life with you! #PerfectProposal #MrsDarbyToBe.' She added a happy face, a big red heart and cartoon likenesses of a bride and groom.
Congratulations flooded in. Darby is known as one of the nicest men in the game, too. They were married in June last year and the picture on Houghton's Twitter biography depicts an idyll, bride and groom hand in hand, walking by the side of a lake at the head of a procession of friends and family.
Two months from now, Houghton, 30, will lead England into the World Cup in France and this time they will not arrive at the tournament as plucky underdogs but as one of the favourites to win it. The competition, televised by the BBC, is likely to create another spike in interest in women's football and will provide Houghton, who is at the peak of her game, with another professional milestone.
But something has changed. Time is no longer her friend. Its march is something to rail against and to scream at. Last September, three months after they were married, Darby, 29, announced his immediate retirement from football and revealed he had been diagnosed with motor neurone disease, a condition that progressively damages the nervous system and for which there is not yet any cure. Houghton, a commanding, unyielding centre half, has not spoken about it until now. She has a horror of fuss and of sympathy. She loathes the idea that any special consideration should be made for her because of what has happened. And when Neville offered her the chance to miss a training session soon after her husband's diagnosis, he says 'she fought tooth and nail' to be allowed to take part in it. It is typical of Houghton's devotion to the team ethic that she has only decided to speak now because she did not want the subject to become a distraction as the World Cup grows near. She is the captain of the side and she accepts that brings added scrutiny.
It is hard to think of many people in sport you would rather go into battle with than Houghton
In 2017, she got engaged to former Liverpool, Bradford and Bolton player Stephen Darby (left)
'We want to be treated as professionals and like the male footballers,' she says, 'and I know that there is going to be a lot more interest in me not just as a footballer but in my life in general and my personal life. There is more pressure and more coverage but we have to be more open to that and realise that it is part of the job.
'It's obviously been a really, really tough year on a personal level, but I can be honest and say I'm sitting here in England colours and I am really focused on England. Of course
