In years to come, Simon Walton's career as a Plymouth Argyle player will be remembered as a series of highs and lows.
He arrived at Home Park at the start of the 2008-09 season, when the Pilgrims were still in the Championship, after Paul Sturrock paid what would have become a club record fee of £750,000, including add-on clauses.
However, the fee never surpassed the £500,000 the Pilgrims paid for Steven MacLean and Walton's early career with the Pilgrims didn't quite go to plan either as Simon failed to hold down a first team spot under Sturrock and his successor, Paul Mariner.
He only made 13 appearances in his first 12 months as an Argyle player and found himself loaned out to Blackpool, Crewe Alexandra and Sheffield United between 2009 and 2010.
His loan stint at Sheffield United also came to a premature end as he sustained an cruciate ligament injury, which saw him return to Home Park for treatment.
Towards the end of the 2010-11 campaign, he was restored to the Pilgrims starting XI by Peter Reid.
By which time the club was in Administration and Simon was one of a number of players who were forced to sign agreements to defer their wages in a bid to keep the Pilgrims alive.
Simon made his return to the Argyle side on April 9th 2011 and nine days later, he scored his first goal for the Pilgrims in a 1-0 win over MK Dons.
Unfortunately, his efforts were too late to save Argyle from a second consecutive relegation, but the story doesn't end here.
Early in the following season, Peter Reid was dismissed as manager of the Pilgrims and was replaced by Carl Fletcher at a time when Argyle only had one point to their name and were still in Administration, as James Brent's takeover of the club was yet to be finalised.
In Fletcher's first game in charge, against Macclesfield Town September 2012, he handed Simon the captaincy as the Pilgrims won 2-0 to secure their first three points of the season.
This proved to be the beginning of an Argyle revival as they went on to secure the points they needed to avoid relegation to the Blue Square Premier.
Simon finished the season as Argyle's top scorer with eight goals in 45 appearances and had agreed a deal to remain at Home Park for the 2012-13 campaign before he agreed the release from his contract to join Hartlepool United.
The move will mean he will be closer to his young daughter, Poppy, as Hartlepool is only 45 minutes away from his family base in Leeds.
At the age of 24, Simon has experienced a lot of issues that most professional footballers will face during an entire career and hopefully he will go to achieve great things in the remainder of it.
