"I tried to control everything - my gestures, my moves, what I'm talking about, every word that I spoke out I controlled. So this was no life. I was like a machine. No life."

In the world of sport, which in its ideal state is supposed to be open and welcoming to all, Marcus Urban inhabited a prison with no visible walls.

The former East Germany youth international footballer, who rose through the ranks alongside some future Germany players and also played at club level for Rot-Weiβ Erfurt, was hiding a part of himself - namely that he was gay.

It got to a point where he had to choose between a promising career in the game (he played as a midfield playmaker in the Rafael van der Vaart) but simultaneously living that prison-like existence, or being true to himself and living his life as an openly gay man.

He chose the latter and left professional football behind in the early 1990s when he was in his early '20s.

Urban's experiences as an LGBT footballer were the subject of a book Versteckspieler: Die Geschichte des schwulen Fußballers Marcus Urban (Hidden Player: The Story of the Gay Footballer Marcus Urban which is the title in English) and he joined us on this week's Team 33 to chat to us.  

Among the topics we spoke about, Urban touched on the treatment of the issue of LGBT people in the East Germany he grew up in, both from a football perspective and the wider society; the struggle to hide who he was to those around him; and how a team-mate reacted when he told him that he was gay.

We also touched on the wider debate about LGBT footballers, at a time when openly gay players in the men's side of the game remain a rare presence.

Listen to the full interview with Marcus on the podcast player or download on iTunes:

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