Jack Bodenham interview
Former South Shields and Blyth Spartans defender Jack Bodenham discusses his time in the North East and helping The New Saints become the first ever Welsh club to reach the group stage of a major European competition
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
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.