Wembley 2024

All kinds of emotions come and go and come back again. I am gutted we didn’t win but the overall feeling is off pride. Pride in the club that worked so hard to get where they are today. They have faced so much in their brief history, and they can stand tall and say we did it. They caused one of the biggest sporting upsets in 1998 by beating Wigan and they are the first winners of the 1895 cup in 2019 and a return visit to Wembly in 2024. It is a case of third time unlucky having won their first two visits and losing the last visit. That is a great achievement especially as the club is only 40 years old.

I can't help but smile when my thoughts turn to the LD team. What an experience it was to go onto the pitch as a flag bearer. I am gutted a couple of players didn’t make it on to the pitch with us. It would have been great to have them on the pitch with us.

Standing on the Wembley pitch is surreal. The stadium is so big that you feel so small but you're on the pitch with your teammates and wearing your team shirt you can’t help but feel 10ft tall. I had the added bonus of having both my kids on the pitch with me. I am so proud of all the LD team and proud to be a part of it. I am so grateful to have had the chance to go on to the pitch with my kids and the LD team. It's a memory that will stay with all for a long time.

Tina Turner starts to sing ‘we don’t need another hero, we don’t need to know the way home’ and it resonates. If it wasn’t for Mark Aston and a few others we wouldn’t have a team let alone gone to Wembley. The club has had a nomadic lifestyle for a while, so I guess we don’t need to know the way home. Hopefully that will change for the better with the prospect of a shared ground with Sheffield FC.