Born-and-bred mid Walian James Turner has been working as Wales’ football performance analyst since 2012.
While at the FAW, he’s worked with many age groups such as the under 19s, 17s and 16s as well as the two regional squads.
More notably, he has been working for the men’s senior team since 2015 who he has spent the majority of time with this year because of the upcoming European Championship.
Not only is Turner from rural surroundings, he grew up on a farm just outside Newtown.
Agriculture and football have never had any sort of natural link but that didn’t halt James in any way.
“I was always interested in football, all sport really but I didn’t know what to do when I was younger," said James. “I didn’t have any pressure to go into anything farming-related, I just didn’t know what to do.”
Turner’s career however began to fall into place at university where he embarked on an undergraduate degree in Sport Science at Cardiff Met – and one module on analysis led to a master's degree in performance analysis, which involved an internship with the FAW.
James said: “There was a module on analysis and I really enjoyed it. That was the start of it really.”
“The internship was the main reason I got the job," added James. "I learnt a lot on my master’s degree but I learnt more working in the field, picking things up from different coaches and managers.
“When I was doing the internship, there was one analyst and now there’s five of us so it’s really grown in the last five years.”
An increasing number of coaches across Europe are getting roles due to their history in analysis – but it's not a route that attracts James.
"A lot of guys I know have a background in coaching," he said. "I’ve never really had the passion to do it.”
The role of performance analyst is no ordinary football job however. As James goes on to say, the information he and his colleagues collect from games have significant influence on the tactics.
“When the game is live, I’ll film the match and have it playing from multiple angles. We send it to the guys on the bench, so I’m in direct contact with the coaches.
“We can impact a game live which is pretty cool.”
Some of those games Turner has impacted included the 2016 European Championship campaign which saw Wales reach an unprecedented semi-final.
He said: “Just being able to be a part of that journey for the whole time was my career highlight so far.
“I sometimes think, what if I could go back and relive that as a fan because it’s great when you’re a part of it but you’re in a bubble this whole time and you can’t fully appreciate the impact outside.”
James will be hoping to guide Wales to more Euros success this summer but admitted it won’t be easy.
James said: “It’s going to be hard isn’t it? Last time we did so good to get to the semi-finals. With the size of our country and small population we’re always the underdogs.
“I think on our day we have good enough players to hurt any team. In the last few years, we’re always in games against top teams.
“I think we’re in a tighter group than 2016. I’m analysing Switzerland and Italy who are especially going to be difficult.”
The players and the managers may get the biggest of accolades but it is the people upstairs, like James, who get all the pivotal data behind the scenes that can influence games.
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