Mark Aizlewood is a name that will be familiar to football fans of a certain age.
Aizlewood, who started his career with Newport County in mid-1970s had a long, successful career in Football League, playing alongside the likes Leeds Bradford, Charlton and Cardiff City.
In addition to winning 39 caps for Wales during the 1980s and 1990s, he also played alongside Vinnie Jones, Dean Saunders and Gary Speed.
Aizlewood left the game in 2000 and returned to it in 2012, as Carmarthen Town manager, a position he held for eight more years until he was sent to prison.
In January 2018 Aizlewood was convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation by offering non-existent sports leadership apprenticeships.
After serving six years in prison, he was released halfway through and is now back as a coach at Carmarthen.
Speaking to Wales Online, Aizlewood said he is not worried about how he is viewed by the general public, and that it goes over his head if someone calls him a “w*****.”
He said: “Even now aged 61, the vast majority of people in Wales over a certain age would have an opinion of myself if they were asked.
“Now there is nothing wrong with that but from my perspective 99.9% of those people I have never spoken a word to in my life and yet they will have a strong opinion of me.
You become so hardened over the years that you won’t listen.
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“I would only worry about the people who know me, who are close to me and who have spent time with me. If they thought I was a w***** then I would worry.
“When somebody who was never met me or spoke to me says I’m a w***** it just goes over my head now.”
Aizlewood did his time and is now out the other side, and the veteran coach revealed that hunger for learning was what got him through his prison experience.
“He explained that he completed an inside course and was trained as a Samaritans listener in jail.
(Image: Media Wales Ltd)
“Anyone who is feeling suicidal could call and you would go to their cell and you would talk through the problems with them. It was another element of what I did to make my time worthwhile.
“If you end up in prison you can go one of two ways. you can wallow in self-pity and eat yourself fat and unhealthy and blame the world blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
“Or you can go the other way and say how am I going to use this time? It is a long time that you have spent in prison. How will you use this time?
“I worked for the education department and I did an additional five or six CPD [Continuing Professional Development] courses for myself as well.
(Image: Getty Images)
“I kept myself on a path. I like learning. I did alcohol and drug awareness courses, I did the Samaritans course, I did criminology ironically.
“I kept myself and my brain going so I knew when I came out of there I would be ready to go back into family life. You can’t go back to normal if you have been a vegetable three years.