In a moving confession, Gregory van der Wiel revealed that the enormous pressure of professional football prevented him from enjoying a single moment of his rich career, during which he won 16 titles. «I won 16 trophies and I didn't feel anything. No joy, no pride. I couldn't enjoy a single moment because I was too busy wearing a mask, pretending I was fine. I became a robot that played a role without feeling it. If you feel this way, that mask doesn't protect you. Kill yourself. Take it off.” Gregory van der Wiel on his Instagram account Van der Wiel described top-level football as a prison in which he lived for 15 years, dominated by fear and anxiety: «What would you give to play without fear? To enter the field and feel completely free? No anxiety before the game, no depression after. Most athletes will never feel this. They will spend their career playing in fear of the coach's reaction, the judgment of the fans, the headlines in the media. And they will call that 'pressure'. It is not. It’s a prison.” To conclude, the Dutchman highlighted that the best version of himself never appeared on the pitch, as doubt and introversion prevented him from expressing himself freely: “I played rigidly when I should have played freely. I held back when I should have exploded. The version of myself that I could have been never saw the light of day and that still haunts me. You, however, still have time. You have time to develop the mindset that will set you free. This inner work is the hardest thing you'll ever do, but it's the one thing that changes everything.” Van der Wiel, now 38, stopped playing in 2018, aged just 30. Having graduated from Ajax, he left in 2013 to represent PSG, where he remained until 2016. He then had short spells at Fenerbahçe, Cagliari and Toronto.