A regional daily’s five-a-side football team has marked 35 years in existence by backing a new fitness campaign.

Liverpool Echo staff have played the short form game on a weekly basis since 1981, and now current members are backing a bid to help make the city the country’s mot active by 2021.

The Fit for Me campaign aims to help everyone – no matter of age and ability – to become more active.

Former Echo Sports editor John Thompson, now 58, was a founder member of the five-a-side club.

Members of the Liverpool Echo’s five-a-side football club

He said: “The legs have gone, the lungs are panting and the touch isn’t up to much at times. But we all still absolutely love it and compete as fiercely as ever to win each week.

“If you love the game, at whatever level, you never want to give up really. And the activity and exercise it gives us really does gives us loads of benefits.”

Current sports editor Dave Prentice has taken part in the sessions since the late 1980s.

He said: “Thirty-five years is a ridiculous amount of time to keep an office five-a-side going really. But we’re all a bit worried that if we stop now, we’ll never start again.

“So we intend to keep going as long as we can but rest assured, if us lot can do it, lots of others out there can too. You’re never too old to start, or stop.”