Defender Josh Flanagan has been speaking about his pride at signing his first professional contract with Northampton Town.
The academy product will join the ranks of professional players next season and says he is delighted to do so.
"I am very proud to sign a professional contract, it has been a long road for me and my family," he said."
"It is a great feeling to become a professional. It has been a tough few years, I had to work hard to break into the team when I got a scholarship and all of the boys in the under 18s this year worked their socks off and any number of the team could have had a claim to get a professional contract.
"I was on the bench for the first team for the 2-1 win at Shrewsbury and I got a taste of things. I didn't get on that day but just to be in and around the first team squad was great and I can't wait to try and get more of that."
We asked Flanagan to talk us through his journey through the academy, and he admits he was something of a late developer.
"I joined the academy as an under 15, which was quite late," he said. "Before then I was playing Sunday League football in Milton Keynes and Bedfordshire, and then I went to a Northampton Town trial day and I was signed from that and things have moved on from there.
"A lot of the first team staff now are former academy staff and that is great for me. Jon Brady has known me for a few years now, he has worked with me from before I was a scholar and he was one of the coaches who has brought me through and has taught me how to play first team football and it feels like home for me here.
"I'm just going to work as hard as I can, I might have a week's break and then it is straight down to hard work through the summer for next season."