With all eyes on tomorrow’s game at Wycombe Wanderers this week’s Preview Show features an interview with Marcus McGuane, former Chairboy John Mousinho takes on the Name Game, we have a full Match Pack and there is a fascinating catch up with goalkeeper Simon Eastwood where he talks about life after football.
“Hopefully I have a good few years left ahead of me“ the 32-year-old keeper said “but even when I first signed back at Oxford in 2016 I had been giving some thought to what I would do after football.
"I think a lot of players leave it too late and then have a bit of a void between playing and what they do next. I didn’t want that so I have been doing a degree in criminology and am in my second year of that now. It’s really interesting and hopefully in the long term it leads on to a job with the police although I want to keep playing as long as I can.
“We are going well at the moment and I am enjoying it a lot. Hopefully we can go to Wycombe and do well. It’s actually an ex Wycombe goalkeeper Scott Shearer who had a big influence on me. He came in here and was coming to the end of his career but he had such high standards, he trained hard every single day and his whole outlook was so positive.”
And after so many years in the game Simon is also hoping to help a next generation of goalkeepers.
“I was lucky, I had a really good goalkeeping coach as a kid and that helped me get my chance as a professional” he says. “But I was watching a bunch of kids train and the keepers were in the middle of the other players doing the same drills. How are they supposed to learn about goalkeeping if they are doing that?
“So I set up my own goalkeeping courses around Bicester because I want to help any young keepers out there. Wayne Brown, our coach, is just as passionate about it and we have started to merge our courses so we can expand a little bit and hopefully get around Oxfordshire a bit more and do more and more specific goalkeeping coaching.
“The coaching and degree are all about the future but I am still very focussed on my own game as well. It should be a great atmosphere on Saturday and it’s a game we are really looking forward to.”
Keep an eye on Simon and Wayne Brown’s goalkeeping courses HERE
See the full interview in the Preview Show below*. Remember, iFollow subscribers get exclusive content as well as early access to the Preview Show ahead of each game.
*Yes, really. Philipp Lahm….