In the first part of our interview with former player Pedj Bojic, we look at how his career led to him joining the Cobblers...
How my love for the game started...
"I started playing football as an 8 year-old," he said.
"I liked watching cricket but I didn't like Rugby League as much. I think it was more from a protest point of view because the area I grew up in didn't really take too kindly to people like me, as I was from a European background. Growing up, I was an AC Milan fan at heart. Paulo Maldini was an inspiration of mine, as was Sinisa Mihajlovic due to my Serbian background. I'd include Marco van Basten in my top three, too."
Playing regularly in Australia before seeing a move to the Premier League fall through...
"I signed my first professional contract in Australia at the age of fifteen, but before that contract, and not many people know this, I was offered a four-year deal with Ipswich Town following a successful trial, and they were in the Premier League at the time.
"All I needed was my Mum's Greek passport to enter the U.K. through being part of the European Union, and I came home from Ipswich super excited and was keen to go back as quickly as possible and get my visa sorted. However, that's when my mother at the time confessed she wasn't actually my real mother, and that my actual mother was Serbian, who weren't part of the EU.
"Therefore, the contract offer became invalid and as you can imagine it hit me in a big way. I felt like I'd lost my identity as a young boy. Off the back of that, I lost my way for a couple of years. I was then given an opportunity at Feyenoord in Holland but I turned it down because I was more keen to go nightclubbing in Australia. That's the stage I was at."
Bouncing back to earn a career in the game, and falling in love with the Cobblers...
"Then a few years down the line and a couple of seasons playing in the Australian league, I managed to get a trial with Northampton Town. I also had a couple of trials with La Liga clubs in the pipeline, too. I fell in love with the Cobblers right away, and it's somewhere where I felt appreciated from the start. I was then offered a contract following the successful trial and that's where it started.
"Moving away from home didn't phase me too much because I'd already spent a month in England whilst at Ipswich. I also moved out from my home in Australia as a teenager so it wasn't an issue for me. I'm a very independent person and enjoyed living on my own, so it was a no-brainer to come and join Northampton.
"Back then, we didn't have the technology that we have now in terms of phones and apps etc so I didn't know too much about English football at that level, to be honest. I was a fan of the Premier League and knew a bit about the Championship, but I was impressed with the standard in the lower divisions straight away. Still to this day I'd say that the divisions I played in with Northampton are to a similar level of the top division in Australia; the A-League."
Just missing out in the play-offs before securing promotion the following year...
"I managed to sort my visa out this time and signed my contract. I arrived around ten days before the first game of the season which was away at Swansea City. We had a good season overall but ultimately we were disappointed to lose out in the play-offs, although that just gave us extra motivation to bounce back the following season.
"We recruited really well that following summer, and the season where we did get promoted we were controlling the majority of the games and we were going into matches with a confidence that we were going to win.
"In League One and Two, typically the teams that do well have a combination of experienced players who've played at a higher level, young up and coming players with good potential and players who've played at that level for a long time.
"We had that in our dressing room and it was a good mixture of experience and players trying to make their way in the game. That helped us a lot and we had a good collective unit with the right leadership in place, which is something you don't always get, and thankfully we went on to get the job done with automatic promotion."
Stay tuned for part two of our interview with Pedj Bojic on ntfc.co.uk in the coming days...