00:00Jack, first of all, congratulations on playing part in what's a historic moment for Welsh
00:05football. If you can just take us into the aftermath of Thursday's second leg, the celebrations were
00:10brilliant to see. What was it like to be part of? Yeah, obviously fantastic to be a part of,
00:17being a Welshman myself as well, to be part of that team that's made history and being the first
00:24Welsh team to make a group stage, obviously. Yeah, it just fills you with immense pride.
00:30Thursday night itself, it was a bit of a weird one. I'm not sure if you'd watched the game,
00:34but it was a bit, they obviously went 9-10 and we were 3-0 up from the first leg.
00:40It was, I don't know, it was a weird sort of end of the game because the last 20-30 minutes,
00:46it almost felt like the game was dead, so it was almost just waiting for it to happen.
00:49And so, not that it felt underwhelming, because obviously it was a great achievement, but
00:55yeah, maybe it was, it wasn't exactly how we felt it would feel, but we still celebrated well and
01:01yeah, amazing feeling. And I'm guessing it kind of probably didn't really sink in until Friday
01:06when the draw was made for the, you know, this new look league stage of the competition and
01:10you draw Fiorentina and, you know, some of the champions in there. I mean,
01:14it must have been unbelievable to see those names coming out.
01:17Yeah, we couldn't have asked for a much better draw, if I'm being honest. There was a few big
01:22boys in there, Fiorentina obviously being one of them, so to draw them and to draw them away was
01:27even sweeter. To be honest, I'd still say it probably hasn't sunk in yet, probably. I don't
01:33think it'll be until we're actually there that it'll probably sink in, but yeah, it's amazing.
01:38We've got some fantastic ties, obviously, travelling over to Shamrock and Ireland as
01:42well. That should be a good one. All British tie and also like Panathinaikos at home,
01:48another big boy. So we've been really lucky in that sense.
01:52I mean, from your point of view, obviously last season ended on a bit of a low with relegation
01:58with Spartans. To be within three months going to a Serie A club, playing against one of the
02:04biggest, probably the biggest club in Greece, or certainly one of, I mean, it's an amazing journey
02:08of having such a short space of time.
02:11Yeah, it's been a bit of a whirlwind, to be honest. Obviously, what happened last year at
02:14Spartans wasn't nice at all. Obviously, I've still got a lot of friends and stuff at the club as
02:20well, whether that be in the playing side of things or behind the scenes with fans and stuff.
02:26So it didn't be quite hard, to be honest, being relegated with them. Not just for myself,
02:32obviously, it's never a nice thing to have on your CV, but for the people in and around the
02:36club as well, because I knew how much it meant to them. So, yeah, but then coming signing back
02:43at TNS and what's happened in the last sort of eight weeks, yeah, it shows how quick football
02:49can change, I think.
02:51I suppose if we go further back, obviously moving to the North East with South Shields
02:55initially, that was a big step in your career as well, to move away from your home, basically,
03:00coming all the way up here to the North East. But what sort of grounding did you get at
03:05South Shields?
03:06Yeah, that was a bit of an unexpected one, I'd say. Leaving, obviously, Cardiff at 21,
03:11I didn't expect to be going. I hadn't really heard of South Shields before I signed for
03:15the club, but everything that was obviously in place there and the success they've had
03:20in the last couple of years shows probably why I made the step to go there, because I
03:25felt like it was the next step for me in gaining experience in men's football. I had a great
03:33grounding there and obviously Fenton, John Shaw as well, they've always been amazing
03:39with me, still stay in contact with them now. And yeah, they helped me a lot in moving up
03:46there as well. It was a great environment for me to begin my journey in men's football,
03:51really.
03:52I mean, that sort of grounding, it's obviously, again, I use that word risk, but you've
03:57obviously dropped down to a non-league level here in England and the North East as well,
04:01in a place you don't know. But it felt as if it was overwhelmingly positive, even what
04:06happened last season with Spartans, that non-league grounding has given you kind of a foundation
04:10to build your career on now?
04:12Yeah, definitely. I think probably I was having this conversation with some family members
04:19the other day and probably when I decided to go to South Shields, I probably feel like
04:24looking back now, I probably went there a bit of a boy and then obviously I spent three
04:30years in the North East, I feel like I've come back like a boy to a man, basically.
04:36So yeah, it's obviously a cliche, but that is probably the experience that I gained up
04:41there, not just on the pitch, but like life experience as well, because I didn't have
04:45nobody up there to rely on. I just had to get on with things myself and probably looking
04:50back, it's like one of the best things I did, to be honest.
04:53Yeah, just looking at the sort of North East links at TNS, there's obviously one very
04:57obvious one in your manager in Craig Harrison. How have you found Craig so far?
05:02Got on really well with him, to be honest. I would have had no hesitation in staying
05:08up in the North East. I get on with the North East people really well, so he's just probably
05:12another one to add to the list and I've thoroughly enjoyed working under him so far. Obviously,
05:17he's had a lot of success at the football club and this is just probably another, like
05:22the cherry on the cake almost for him now.
05:25And just looking at the future, I mean, the immediate future is obviously the league and
05:30obviously this conference league adventure now. It's such an exciting time for the club,
05:34a lot going on and really just a lot to relish, I guess.
05:39Yeah, definitely. I think it's a weird one because obviously we don't want to take our
05:43focus on the league too much because obviously there's still a job to be done there. Straight
05:48back to it tomorrow night. Obviously, we've got a game, so we've got to switch our league
05:53heads back on, but at the same time, you don't want to let it pass us by as well,
05:57the experience at Europe. And hopefully we can, you want to enjoy it, but you also want
06:01to be a success in it as well. We don't want to obviously be remembered for being one of
06:07the worst teams in the competition. Now we've made a group stage, so you still want to keep
06:11striving to get better. And yeah, that's exactly what we'll be doing.
06:17Well, I was going to say, because there's no point going in there just to take part.
06:21You want to try and be successful in the competition. You want to try and go as far
06:24as you can. And I've got some ties that you can look at. I mean, obviously, we know Fiorentina
06:30is going to be a huge challenge and Panathinaikos, you know, big, big clubs, big players. But
06:34there are ties there that you'd be looking at, thinking we could do something here.
06:38Yeah, we've already looked at it ourselves as players as well. There haven't been too
06:45much focus on it from like a staff perspective, but I'm sure they're doing their own work as
06:51well. But yeah, as players, we've looked at certain ties and we think, well, we could
06:54maybe get this from that, this from that. And obviously the way the competition's formatted
07:01now, it gives teams like ourselves now who've made that group or league phase an actual
07:08opportunity of qualifying as well with the top 24 going through. So that's, even though
07:13we're obviously ecstatic to be there, that's got to be our next goal now to try and qualify
07:18for the next part.
