Livingston new boy desperate to make most of chance after late arrival to the sport

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Livi new boy Michael Nottingham knows all about the hard work and graft that defines the club.The 34-year-old centre-back used to play a game at 3pm then head directly to Asda for a nightshift that wouldn’t finish until 6 o’clock the following morning whilst juggling playing with studying at Derby University and seeing family.So it’s perhaps no real surprise that he wants to cling on to being a professional footballer for as long as possible and why he felt the chance to experience the likes of full houses at Ibrox and Parkhead was too good to turn down.The 6ft 4in defender arrives in West Lothian having only turned pro at 29 and after a three-year stint at Accrington Stanley.

It’s a far cry from the lower reaches of English football where he has spent most of his career.He said: “I’ve been through so many levels and they really toughen you up.

Playing at the pro levels in England and in different leagues, you see all sides of it. I feel like me turning pro later in my career, you almost have more of an appreciation of the route you’ve taken.“Being in the Scottish Premiership now, if you told me when I was 24, 25, having just finished uni ‘you’ll be playing in the Scottish Premiership in 10 years’ I’d have said ‘shut up, come on.

Every day is a blessing for me, I love football and I don’t know what I’d do without it. I’m 34 now but the thought of not playing scares the life out of me.”Nottingham started his career in the eighth tier of English football before taking two steps down to play at Castle Vale in 2010.