Jonny Evans' first game for Northern Ireland was not just memorable because he was 18 and pulling on a shirt for his country for the first time at senior level.
The centre-back's debut came against Spain in a famous 3-2 win during the qualifiers for the 2008 European Championships.
Speaking to Graham Hunter on his podcast this week, Evans explained how his debut came about.
It's actually a funny story. Well, I think it's a funny story.
I played, I think it was against Germany, for the U21s, on a Friday night. I get a call on a Saturday night. Northern Ireland have been beaten 3-0 by Iceland and [Lawrie] Sanchez was not happy.
I got a call, 'We want you in the full squad tomorrow morning.' I think I was actually on my day out to a nightclub. I carried on my night anyway and joined up with the squad the next day.
We were training and I think Sanchez could see after a few sessions that I could use my left foot. So he's thought, 'Right, I'll put him at left-back in the session.' As I'm playing left-back, he's thought, 'I'm going to have to play him.'
He was so impressed with me in training, he just thought he'd have to throw me in. He just said to me, 'You're going to play.'
Evans was on loan at Belgian side Royal Antwerp from Man Utd at the time. Northern Ireland manager Lawrie Sanchez did not know much about him prior to his call-up to the senior squad.
He became aware of Evans because of the son of his assistant, Terry Gibson, had spotted the young defender while playing Football Manager.
Terry Gibson later told me that the reason I got called up... Sanchez didn't know anything about me at the time, I played reserve football.
He [Gibson] said, 'We didn't know anything about you, but my son saw you on Championship Manager.'
The son recommended me to Terry, Terry recommended me to Sanchez and that's how it went. I ended up playing the game, 3-2, a David Healy hat-trick.
