Fulham striker Barry Hayles went from non-league right-back into Premier League strike partnership with Louis Saha - and is yet to hang up his boots having smashed home goals into his 50s.
A whopping 18 years after leaving the Premier League and 12 years after initially retiring, Barry Hayles is still smashing home goals - and he has no plans to quit football anytime soon.
Having turned 50 back in May, former Jamaica international Hayles is in his 20th club spell across a career that has included over 315 goals and double figures at the highest level.
Born in Lambeth, south London back in 1972, Hayles began his career with Willesden Hawkeye and Stevenage Borough before getting his Football League chance with third-tier Bristol Rovers in 1997.
Speaking to Daily Star Sport, Hayles said: "I went to Stevenage as a right-back and the manager said he needed a striker. I scored in that game and that was it.
"I was happy as a defender, I thought that was my best position but apparently not. Some of my old team-mates still say I was better at the back but there we go."
While progressing from a semi-professional defender into a top-flight forward, Hayles was snapped up by Ian Holloway's Bristol Rovers for a substantial fee of £250,000.
Hayles added: "Yeah there was definitely pressure on my shoulders. The manager had called me the summer before and said he'd come back in, and true to his word he did.
"He said he would build a team that would get me goals and my first season I got the golden boot in the third tier with 23 in the league.
"Holloway was a great man-manager - he knew when to have fun and when things needed to be serious. We had a lot of fun."
Having scored 36 goals for the club across his 76 fixtures and rejected a move to rivals Bristol City to the delight of Rovers fans, Fulham came calling.
The London outfit had just been taken over by businessman Mohamed Al Fayed, who had promised to spend £20million on revamping Craven Cottage and bringing in new players with the target of getting into the Premier League within five seasons.
With Hayles joining for £2million under the management of Kevin Keegan, he helped Fulham into the second tier with eight goals - and the top flight with 18 two years later.
He added: "Bristol City had put in a £2m bid in that was accepted by the club but I turned it down, I couldn't go there. I took the gamble and stayed but when Fulham came, it was a perfect fit to go back to London.
"Al Fayed had come in and he brought players from higher leagues to Fulham and he completely changed the ethos of the club. At the same time there was youngsters like Sean Davis coming through so it was a great mix.
"Keegan signed me so that was a buzz, when I came in he made me feel like I was one of the best players in the world and it all clicked from there."
Fulham's 2000/01 Division One success came after France icon Jean Tigana had taken the helm, with Louis Saha, Steve Finnan, Chris Coleman and Luis Boa Morte among those to shine.
Hayles added: "The players we had as well as a great social group, it all blended on and off the pitch. It was a perfect fit."
Fulham won 30 of their 46 league fixtures to secure an 101 point tally, with Hayles and Boa Morte both scoring 18 times and Saha netting an hugely impressive 27.
Hayles said of his route to the top: "It was an amazing feeling to look back at where I came from, but I always had confidence in myself."
The combative forward, who was on one occasion taken aside by Tigana and told to stop getting in the face of opponents, scored eight times in his first top-flight campaign as Fulham finished a more than respectable 13th - with Hayles thriving along Saha.
He added: "He was by far the best player I played with. He had it all. In training I used to tell him to tone it down to give the lads a bit of confidence. He was that good."
With Saha going on to play for France, Hayles had call ups from as many as three different international sides starting with the England C non-league outfit as a youngster.
Scoring twice across his two appearances, that spell was followed by a call from the Cayman Islands, before FIFA changed the regulations over who was eligible - and finally making 10 appearances for Jamaica.
Hayles said: "For the Cayman Islands back then you could qualify if you had a British passport, so I ended up going out there and they changed the rules during the week!
"With Jamaica, they came in after I got into the Premier League with Fulham but it wasn't a great set-up at the time, a bit of disarray. It wasn't what I expected."
Following further Premier League finishes of 14th and 9th for Fulham, Hayles found himself playing a reduced role under former team-mate Chris Coleman - leaving in 2004 for Sheffield United.
Having not seen eye-to-eye with Neil Warnock, Hayles then played under Dennis Wise at Millwall and Holloway again at both Plymouth and Leicester before a final Football League spell with Cheltenham Town.
Having been 38 at the time, Hayles saw fit to call time on his career before a series of offers have kept him on the pitch a full 12 years later.
Hayles said: "I retired after leaving Cheltenham and then I got a phone call. A had an old team-mate at Truro City and he asked if I wanted to go and play for them.
"I met the chairman and he asked for me to come on board and I scored 20 goals that season."
Two further spells at Truro, in which Hayles was given the keys to a plush mobile home having driven down for each fixture, have come before and after nine non-league spells in total.
Having scored 42 goals across three-and-a-half seasons with Truro, Hayles scored eight in 21 for St Albans back in 2012/13 and 15 for Chesham United before returning to Windsor this July after three seasons with Merstham.
Hayles has been in action for The Royalists in the Combined Counties League Premier Division North so far in 2022/23, making seven appearances and netting in their win over Flackwell Heath in September.
In a throwback to the complaints of Tigana, Hayles has also spent two 10 minute spells in the non-league sin bin for good measure.
Having boldly predicted in a 2002 interview that his career would go on longer than most, Hayles has no plans to call it a day on the pitch despite his current role being a primarily coaching position - and also lines up for England's over 50s.
Hayles concludes: "If the offers keep coming in then I don't see a reason to stop."