, having returned as boss last summer Sir Bobby Robson is the only Englishman to have managed more Champions League matches than TNS boss Craig Harrison. Harrison is yet to progress further than the second qualifying round as he plots the latest campaign in European football's elite club competition for the Welsh Premier League champions. But whatever happens when TNS face Swedish champions Hacken later this month, it's fair to say the 45-year-old is already a winner. Twenty years ago, Harrison turned his back on the game after a promising playing career which saw him force his way into a Middlesbrough team that featured Paul Gascoigne, Paul Merson and Juninho was ended at the age of 24 by a devastating injury. Like Gascoigne and Merson, he was plunged into a battle with depression after suffering a double stress fracture of his left leg - until football offered salvation. 'It took me about 10 years to come to terms with it,' recalled Harrison. 'I had left Boro to join Crystal Palace because I was behind Christian Ziege and Dean Gordon. And I asked to play in a reserve game against Reading one Tuesday afternoon because I wanted to build up my fitness after dislocating my shoulder. 'Little did I know how it would change my life. It was a bad tackle. But I had just done the other lad with a bad one. The difference was I ended up with a broken tibia and fibula. After that, I didn't want anything to do with football. 'It had broken my heart. It took me two or three years before I could even watch a game on TV. The dream I'd shared with all the lads I grew up with in Gateshead was over - and I started a new career buying and renovating houses.' Harrison added: 'I was in a pretty dark place when my wife, Danielle, arranged a 30th surprise birthday party for me and one of the guys playing in the band she'd hired was the former Welsh international Gareth Owen. 'Gareth){kind=link}
Former Middlesbrough and Crystal Palace defender Craig Harrison now manages Welsh side The New Saints (TNS), having returned as boss last summer
Sir Bobby Robson is the only Englishman to have managed more Champions League matches than TNS boss Craig Harrison.
Harrison is yet to progress further than the second qualifying round as he plots the latest campaign in European football’s elite club competition for the Welsh Premier League champions. But whatever happens when TNS face Swedish champions Hacken later this month, it’s fair to say the 45-year-old is already a winner.
Twenty years ago, Harrison turned his back on the game after a promising playing career which saw him force his way into a Middlesbrough team that featured Paul Gascoigne, Paul Merson and Juninho was ended at the age of 24 by a devastating injury. Like Gascoigne and Merson, he was plunged into a battle with depression after suffering a double stress fracture of his left leg – until football offered salvation.
“It took me about 10 years to come to terms with it,” recalled Harrison. “I had left Boro to join Crystal Palace because I was behind Christian Ziege and Dean Gordon. And I asked to play in a reserve game against Reading one Tuesday afternoon because I wanted to build up my fitness after dislocating my shoulder.