With everyone away from the Oval for an undetermined period, we have decided to bring Glentoran supporters some of the most compelling content from the multi award winning Glentoran Gazette. We hope you will enjoy the stories and player interviews we bring and that it will encourage you to buy a Gazette at our home matches when football returns. Many thanks to the Glentoran Supporters Committee (1923) for use of this material. The "Team Talks" series will consist of interviews with current squad members with John Grayden this season.
Jonny Frazer
interview with John Grayden
Even though his last club was Australian, speedy forward Jonny Frazer was one of the few players to sign for Glentoran at the start of the season who is not part of the international brigade.
Instead, like so many of the players who arrived at the Oval in the summer, it was an injury that ultimately led him to east Belfast. And while it robbed him the chance of experiencing sunshine football, the former Linfield and Ards players has no regrets about being here.
The software project manager with BT had a longstanding offer to play in Australia and his employers gave him the option of a sabbatical last year. “I thought if I didn’t take it at that point, I might not get the opportunity again. I always had the intention of returning home, just maybe not so soon,” Jonny said.
His problem began when he tore a hamstring while still playing for Ards shortly before he was due to sign for Melbourne-based Altona City on a temporary visa.
“When I got to Australia it was a lot worse than I thought and I wasn’t able to play. The club is allowed to sign three players on a visa and funnily enough the other two were former Glens players, Johnny Black and John McGuigan,” Jonny added.
“So when I wasn’t able to play, the club let me go. I came back to Northern Ireland towards the end of last season to undergo rehab. In fact, Ards tried unsuccessfully to register me again but because of rules, I wouldn’t have been able to re-sign until the close season.
“I’m very friendly with Cameron Stewart and after he signed for the Glens, Paul Millar had heard I was back home and asked him about me. So I met him and Mick and they told me about their plans for the club.”
Far from having regrets about the aborted move Down Under, the man who spent loan spells at Warrenpoint and Ballymena during a five year stint with Linfield before his move to Ards thinks his move to the Glens has helped him.
“I feel I am now a better player for coming here and I feel I will get better still,” Jonny said. “I’m at a stage where I want the extra professionalism I’ve found at the Glens, I want the extra training.”
Jonny, one of the few part-timers among the ten players who joined the club this season, has had to up his training regime to three sessions a week.
“I’m working with the squad on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays at the moment. We have a late afternoon start but thankfully the bosses at BT have been good to me and allow me to leave early on those days. I make the time up by coming in earlier in the mornings,” he added.
“It is tough combining a full-time job with the demands football places on you but I’m enjoying things at the moment and I wouldn’t be doing it if I didn’t want to. I feel I’ve settled well. It’s a good changing room and I feel as if I’ve made a lot of friends at the Oval, Jonny said.
One of those friends, of course, is new housemate Navid Nasseri. “He’s a good lad and a good cook so he prepares a lot of the meals. I do all of the driving,” he added.
“This is one of the biggest clubs in the league and I’ve joined at a time when things have been changing for the better. It’s an exciting time to be at the Glens.
“I don’t mean to be disrespectful to some of the other clubs I’ve played for but the facilities at the Oval like the new gym are a lot better. On top of that we have a full-time manager, we have full-time players and we play in front of bigger crowds than most other teams do. It’s what most footballers want,” Jonny added.
“Mick leads training – not every manager in the Irish league does that. And he prepares his team not just physically but also with his eye on the game ahead. He has been around and it shows. His experience comes to bear on the team.”
Even the fact that he is not getting the amount of game time he might at another club in spite of scoring a quick-fire hat-trick in his home debut in the League Cup second round tie against Ballyclare Comrades hasn’t put him off.
“Everyone wants to play as much as possible, that’s only natural. I knew it would be difficult to break into the team here. At the same time the position is what it is expected to be at a top club with a lot of competition for places.
“Mick and Windy have been good with me, I think they like me. At the moment my role is off the bench and I’m trying to do that to the best of my ability.
“I class myself as a forward, I think I can play anywhere across the front line and ideally I would like to be playing off a central attacker but that’s difficult with the system we are using at the moment.
“I don’t think Mick looks at his squad as full-time or part time players although it is undoubtedly hard to get past players who maybe have come from abroad and have more experience than me.”
