Dubliner Shane Byrne had his career derailed after picking up glandular fever on a pre-season tour to the Southeast Asia with Leicester City ten years ago.
Now he's chasing a piece of play-off glory in the less glamorous, but ferociously competitive environs of non-league English football.
This Sunday, Kidderminster Harriers will travel to Brackley Town in the National League North play-off final, the sixth tier of the game across the water and a division that's notoriously difficult to escape.
The winners will be promoted to the National League [recently won by Ryan Reynolds' and Rob McElhenney's Wrexham], which is one rung below League Two - the promised land for all clubs scrapping in the lower terrain.
Kiddy are one of the bigger names in the league. They slid out of League Two in 2005 and haven't been back since, but the midlands club have a good fanbase and an attractive, 7,000-capacity ground [the Aggbrorough Stadium].
Fifteen months ago they were seconds away from beating West Ham in the fourth round of the FA Cup, Declan Rice's stoppage-time goal forcing extra-time before Jarrod Bowen won it for the Hammers in the 121st minute. They're desperate for more big days and nights and are on the cusp of what would be a significant stride forward in their quest to return to the Football League.
Helping them will be 30-year-old Byrne, the well-travelled ex-Republic of Ireland underage international who has overcome serious setbacks to carve out a career in the game.
Byrne first turned the heads of English scouts as a boy at Crumlin United, moving over to Leicester City in 2008 when he was 15 years old. The Foxes were in League One then, managed by Nigel Pearson. The arrival of billionaire Thai businessman Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha two years later would catapult the club towards a fairytale Premier League title in 2016, but Byrne would not be part of that dream.
His life changed in 2013, just after he'd returned to the Foxes from a successful loan spell at League One Bury, who he had agreed to to sign with permanently.
Then, things took a nasty twist.
"I went from 83kg to 69kg. I couldn't eat. I was a shadow of myself."
"In the off season, with the Thailand connection, Leicester went to a Hong Kong Sevens tournament," Byrne tells RTÉ Sport.
"We went to Thailand for four days, went to Hong Kong for another four and then back to Thailand for four. I ended up getting glandular fever while I was over there. I didn't realise it until about four months into my Bury contract. I lost a load of weight, I couldn't eat, I was sleeping 20 hours a day.
"I came back for pre-season and I was terribly unfit. I was doing so bad in all the tests at Leicester.
"Then I went to Bury. The manager at the time said, 'you don't look the same player'. I said, ' I don't feel it'. They sent me for blood tests and it came back that I had glandular fever. I went from 83kg to 69kg. I couldn't eat. I was a shadow of myself.
"When I look back on photos of myself at that time, I think I was skinnier than my girlfriend. I could get into her clothes!
"I was diagnosed in October. I missed that whole year, came back the next pre-season and I was basically told there was no place for me there, that I could move on if I need to. And that was fine with me. I'd rather go and try my chances elsewhere than stay with a manager that didn't want me at the time."
Byrne became a bit of a nomad, initially coming home to play with Bray Wanderers for a short period before heading back to England with his girlfriend.
In total he reckons it took him two and a half years to get back to where he'd been before the illness.
But the Tallaght man had the hunger and humility to drop down and start again as he sought a way back into the game.
"Bill Wall, the scout who signed me for Leicester, he knew a lad who was managing Corby Town [in the Evo-Stik Southern League] at the time. He asked me to come in and play a game. I didn't know a lot about non-league football. I was hedging my bets that I'd get somewhere higher.
"I ended up spending the year there playing 50 games and winning a league. That was the start of my non-league journey."
That journey has taken him to Nuneaton, Brackley - who he will face this weekend - Boston United and, finally, Kidderminster.
"Brackley's gaffer, him and his assistant, I shared a car with them for five years," Byrne adds when reflecting on Sunday's showdown against his old team.
"We were really close. They both came on my stag do. It'll be an interesting one.
"I liken our league, the National League North, to the Championship. It is proper tough, really hard to get promoted out of. There's no easy points - ever. If you look at this season, Chorley were fourth ahead of the last game of the [regular] season and they ended up finishing 13th. That's what the league has been like for years.
"Salford for example, they had back-to-back promotions but they got stuck at our level for a couple of years. Then they went straight up from the National League, so it's a really tough level to get promoted out of."
It's full-time football at Kiddy but Byrne does have another career behind him; he's currently completing his training as a domestic electrical installer.
He'll hope there's a few more crackles and sparks in a career where nothing has come easy - starting on Sunday.
"There are some big clubs at this level," he adds. "I'd liken Kidderminster to a sleeping giant. It's a great club, the stadium is fantastic, they've got a rich history.
"The fan base has been outstanding to be honest. They've got stuck in the Conference North for a lot longer than they'd have expected. This is a first chance to get us closer to where we all think they belong."
