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As Sam Squire stood at the front of a classroom full of Year 7 pupils, they were hanging on his every word.

He was explaining to the Netherhall School youngsters the next stage of their project as part of an Enterprise Day with Form The Future, where they were creating business concepts aimed at helping some of the problems faced in society.

Renewable shoes, initiatives to help the homeless, a VR running machine and a multi-purpose pen were just some of the proposals.

After the initial address, Squire moved around with ease to each group, softly questioning their proposals and making suggestions to help them prepare for a Dragon’s Den-style pitch later in the day.

It was impressive to see the connection and rapport that had been built with the students in just a couple of hours, especially given it is still a relatively new role for the 22-year-old.

In a different life, Squire would have been addressing the class years down the line, after a successful career in professional football, regaling stories of famous wins, matches and moments.

But after 11 years with Cambridge United, like for so many other youngsters up and down the country, it was not quite meant to be. Instead, he has found so much more fulfilment in other areas.

“It’s been a weird journey,” he explains.

“With each experience I’ve had, it’s then led me to get to know what I really want to do.

“As I was doing the course whilst working for the Community Trust, I knew I really wanted to use that skill to work with young people.

“It’s the dynamic of working with young people, especially from a disadvantaged background as there’s a lot of external things that have been out of their control whereas creating a certain safe environment with that approach gives them control to change their lives.”

Sitting in the Atrium Hall at Netherhall, it is the first time that we have caught up outside a football setting. We are talking during break time and you could see the curiosity of other visitors who were attending as part of the Enterprise Day.

Squire is there with the business consultancy Shift Momentum, which is transitioning into a community interest company (CIC) called Inspire to Ignite.

They usually work with 16 to 24 year olds not in education, employment or training, although this particular day is a different branch to their work, with Form The Future.

However, the enthusiasm is exactly the same for Squire.

Having first met during his United scholarship, what always stood out was the way he came across; you could not fail to be impressed by his level-headed approach and overall outlook, which still shines through.

It could of course have been very different after being released by United after one year on a professional deal, but the former midfielder had been braced for the news.

“I found out probably a week before the season finished,” Squire explains, looking back to the summer of 2019.

“As I was there for 11 years. I thought ‘if I haven’t found out now, then there’s a bit of……' I already had contingencies and was always looking ahead anyway, just in case.

“If I’m honest, I kind of knew, I was just holding on. Like anything in life, you always hold on to hope but I was realistic about it as well.

“I also made sure that even with my education, with what I was planning or lining up ahead of it, I was in a place where I thought, if this doesn’t happen, I have this or I can go to this trial or I have this qualification.”

You always imagine that it must be difficult for a then 19-year-old, who had invested so much into a dream since joining the club aged eight, and could leave a last mark on some players, but not Squire.

“Weirdly, it wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be,” he says.

“I knew that I literally gave everything I could and I just wasn’t up to the standard.

“I remember driving away from the training ground and thinking ‘I know I have nothing left in me’. Whereas I think if I hadn’t done that, the process and the experience after that would have been really horrible.

“I looked at myself in the mirror, and gone ‘I genuinely have given everything’.”

By that point, a pathway to the future was already materialising.

Squire has in the past talked in great depth and emotion about how his mum had tried to commit suicide while he was a teenager, and how that was a motivation to work with the Cambridge United Community Trust during his scholarship.

He helped on their pioneering mental health work Mind Your Head programme and, on being released, joined the Trust while studying at the Institute of Continuing Education on a bursary.

“There was an alignment of many different things, it was just the perfect fit,” says Squire.

“It was like the two connections of the coaching, the past experience of working with the Trust and working with young people, it just fell into place.”

Football had not completely bitten the dust though, and he tried to continue in the semi-pro game, first with Dereham Town and more recently with Biggleswade Town.

The aspiration to make it as a footballer remained.

“I did have the first season back, I wanted to try and smash the season out to then go get back in the pro game,” he explains.

“Whereas then Covid almost hit twice. Now, if I’m honest, I actually don’t plan to go back into semi-pro football this season because of my career.

“When I exercise now, I’m not doing it because I have to be fit for football, I’m doing it because I have to be fit for myself - and that’s quite a nice place to be.”

There is so much to be inspired by both Squire’s honesty and choices.

At just 22, it would be so easy to continue chasing the football dream, switching clubs in the grassroots from season to season in the hope of getting one last chance at the pro game, but it is perhaps a braver option to step away.

“There is nothing wrong with coming out of football either,” he says.

“People think that you have to be in it your whole life, and I know a lot of people even in non-league now that are just playing football to get by because it does pay a bit.

“They’re not actually playing for the reason they started, which was the love of it. Now I would only step back on the pitch if that was the case.”

Having been curtailed by a knee injury last season at Biggleswade, Squire turned to the decks as a DJ to pick up another hobby.

As a lover of house and dance music, it even led to doing a set at Basing House in Shoreditch earlier this summer.

“Life has been just a bit mental really,” he laughs. “When I tell people what has happened and what I do, they genuinely think I’m just lying - they think I’m like Jay out of Inbetweeners!”

It is fair to say that he has crammed a lot into his 22 years.

“I think life is about how much life you get in the years.” he comments.

“You could be 65 but you might have lived 20 years as you’ve gone through the motions, whereas if you just keep trying to get the most out of every day you can achieve a lot and experience a lot.”

Squire may not have made a professional appearance for United, but everything about his story is in many ways inspirational.

He has shaped a life, and career, away from the game - while admitting that describing the football past can help capture the attention in settings such as Netherhall - and is clearly driven by helping young people fulfil their creativity and potential.

“It gives me purpose because I wake up every morning and know that I need to serve people – I’m lucky to have actually found that at such a young age,” he says.

“I feel like I’ve genuinely found my dream job. From that purpose, it gives me energy to do more.

“I think it also gives me accountability to myself as I have to be better to serve these people.

“The thing I enjoy most is seeing a young person change. Positively change their behaviour, and their mindset and outlook to life but, more importantly, change their beliefs about themselves.

“From certain experiences that they may have had in their life that may have formed a certain belief system within themselves, then when you see that change, and think ‘oh, I can do this, I can achieve this’ - it’s almost the spark that creates a snowball effect.

“What’s cool about working with young people is there’s this analogy that it’s like planting a seed - it could grow in a minute, it could grow in a second, or it could grow in 10 years.”

While the beautiful game may have offered much, it is clear that Squire has found his own calling.