IT has been a great week for yours truly in terms of my personal life, even if it has been a bad one for us Newport County fans.

My gorgeous fiancée Victoria gave birth to a baby boy on Thursday, Edward Michael, who is named after my uncle Ted and takes his middle name from his daddy.

Edward is my fourth, joining my daughter Dionne and sons Charlie and Theo in the world and I am excitingly now just one shy of starting my own five-a-side team!

All jokes aside, there really isn’t a more special feeling in the world and Victoria was absolutely fantastic, especially considering it was a little stressful as our boy decided to arrive 15 days ahead of schedule.

Anyone who knows me knows I’m not the most patient sort and it seems he isn’t either!

The whole thing seemed to go really fast, Victoria described it as surreal and who am I to argue?

But we are both obviously delighted and very happy, mother and son are both doing well and are already at home.

Due to the unexpected arrival I won’t be making the trip to York today, because the lads had an overnight stay and I don’t want to leave the baby, not so soon after an early birth.

I told Jimmy Dack at the start of the week that obviously it could happen any time and it would be unlikely that I’d be available for selection and he was very understanding.

But sad as it is to say it, if Lee Minshull is back and fit to play, it’s unlikely I’d have seen any action anyway, even from the bench.

I’ve already stated that I feel I had more to give this season in terms of my contribution to the first team, there is life in the old dog yet, but Jimmy obviously doesn’t seem to agree with that viewpoint.

Not a lot of people know this, but I actually had the opportunity to go out on loan to another League Two club earlier this year, which I turned down flat.

Don’t get me wrong, it was tempting and at any other stage in my career, I would have left to play first team football. Because playing regularly and doing my best has always been the most important thing to me, throughout my career.

I think Jimmy decided I didn’t have the legs to play in a 4-4-2 system and he hasn’t seemed to change his mind since we went to 3-5-2, so I just have to abide by his decision even though I don’t agree.

Like I say, under nearly any other circumstances, I would have walked away this season, but Newport is my club and the scenario is different in as much as I am doing stuff with the youth academy.

I’ve so enjoyed that aspect that I didn’t and won’t want to walk away from it, to the point of it becoming my main focus over playing.

I have absolutely no doubts in my mind whatsoever that I can still cut it as a player in the Football League, for Newport or someone else, but my focus is on staying here.

If I have a choice between playing elsewhere or doing the youth academy at Newport next season, I will choose the latter. That’s how important it has become to me.

Although that might mean I am only a few weeks from retirement as a player. And that will be a very strange feeling indeed if it proves to be the case.

But until I hear from someone at the club about next season, I’m waiting on tenterhooks like everyone else.

I’m not going to say things are rosy with us at the moment, because they aren’t.

Sad as it is to say, Aaron O’Connor is right when he says the spirit in the dressing room has suffered, because it certainly has.

It isn’t just about our poor form; there is a degree of uncertainty now with less than two weeks left in the season.

We don’t know who will be the manager next season, we don’t know our futures and we’re on a poor run of form. But those factors all together and spirit inevitably suffers.

Which isn’t to say the boys have lost any focus on the job in hand, because we know that only six points from the last two games gives us any chance at all of making the League Two play-offs.

It couldn’t really be simpler, because it isn’t in our hands anymore, but we absolutely have to win both the games and hope results go in our favour. And let’s be honest, stranger things have certainly happened in football.

I’m not going to tell you we are going to win, because my predictions have been rubbish recently, but I can assure you the boys will go absolutely everything to try and take advantage of any slip-ups. The pressure isn’t on us anymore, it’s on Plymouth, Stevenage and Luton.

And we will battle right until the final minute of the season to try and overhaul them. That’s a promise.