Mile Jedinak has 79 caps for Australia, has played at three World Cups, secured two promotions to the Premier League and captained his club to unlikely survival in England’s top flight. It’s fair to say that he has a lot to reflect upon from his career.
He opens the door with a warm greeting, wearing a black Adidas t-shirt and grey tracksuit bottoms.
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The Athletic has been invited into his home and it offers a glimpse into the personality of one of Palace’s most popular and successful captains. He was never the flashy type as a player, and his house is welcoming without being overbearing. The decor is simple but modern, with a small family picture in the hallway. In the lounge, the TV is showing BBC News.
Jedinak lives with his wife Natalie and four sons Luka, who is 11 weeks old, Leo, two, Alexander, six, and Andre, seven. The back garden is clustered with toys but most prominent are the seven-a-side and five-a-side goals where he spends his spare time playing football with his boys.
Inside, there are football shirts signed by Pele, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, and an Australia shirt with the signatures of last year’s World Cup squad framed in one of his children’s bedrooms. They take their place among the football trophies collected by his sons.
Hanging on one of the walls is also a picture of him lifting the 2013 Championship play-off final trophy — a gift from Crystal Palace when he left.
“I was on my knees like, ‘I can’t believe this.’ It’s an incredible experience and feeling. You’ve achieved the dream of playing in the Premier League,” he says of hearing the final whistle in that 1-0 win over Watford at Wembley.
“I was part of something special. Would I have wanted to do it another way? Looking back, no. It made me appreciate what is achievable even when everything is stacked against you according to everyone else. Little old Crystal Palace, who should have been relegated in that season, ends up getting promoted.”
Jedinak, now 35, made 178 appearances over six seasons at Palace after signing in 2011, winning promotion to the top flight and being the first captain to keep the club in the Premier League beyond a single season. In the process, he established himself as a fan favourite with his combative holding midfield presence.
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He arrived in England from Genclerbirligi, in Turkey, having spent his early career in Australia with Sydney United and Central Coast Mariners
Despite an underwhelming debut season at Palace, in which he freely admits the fans “probably thought I was crap”, he would take the captaincy the following campaign after Paddy McCarthy was sidelined through injury. He kept the role until Alan Pardew stripped the armband from him four years later, appointing defender Scott Dann in his place.
“There was a conversation regarding my own situation,” he says. “I was told I wouldn’t be the captain anymore. That was it.
“Armband or not, it didn’t change much. You have to be professional enough to handle it. I just got on with it. I knew I had the respect of everyone in the changing room. The first conversation I had with Scott I just said, ‘Get on with what you have to do. If you need any help, you know I’m here.'”
It was under Pardew that Jedinak’s Palace career would come to an end, and he joined Villa in 2016.
“I only knew I was leaving the moment I finished playing against West Brom (on the opening day of the 2016-17 season),” he says. “The interest was there that week but we were preparing for the game. I knew I’d have to play and I wanted to play. I didn’t care about the situation. What happened after that? I was sold. That’s business and that’s football. I only had a year left on my contract and nothing could be done about it.”
Did he feel forced out?
“Not necessarily. There was an opportunity there (to join Villa). Would I have liked to prolong my stay at Palace? Absolutely,” Jedinak continues. “You accept the situation and try to deal with it. It definitely wasn’t easy but you understand that this is football and you still have the club’s best interests at heart.
“I didn’t have any conversation with him (Pardew). The last conversation was when the club heard about the interest (from Villa) and he just said I had to play at the weekend. I don’t remember any other conversation, but there may have been.”
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He is fairly succinct in discussing his relationship with Pardew, who was sacked four months later with the team in danger of being relegated.
“It was a professional relationship,” he says. “I was just another player in the squad and I just got on with the job. I was there as a member of the team to lead by example and do what I had to do to get on with the task.
“You can only see what happened afterwards to see was it approached in the right way. It’s not a surprise.”
We move on to discussing what ought to be a highlight of his club career — the FA Cup final against Manchester United in 2016. Jedinak, though, reveals it was actually his worst moment at the club and the only regret in those six seasons.
It was “the one that got away” and “one of the hardest things to take”.
Jason Puncheon’s 78th-minute goal allowed Palace fans to dream of avenging defeat by United in the 1990 final, only for Juan Mata to equalise three minutes later to force extra-time before Jesse Lingard volleyed home a winner.
“The FA Cup is always tricky as the league is in the back of your mind. Our league form was shocking,” he says. “But once we got to the semi-final and we knew we were playing Watford, I knew we were going to get there.
“You knew Crystal Palace don’t often make FA Cup finals. Why not be the first ones to lift an FA Cup? It almost was us. That’s the hardest thing to take from it all.”
He ponders for a while when recalling his reaction to the defeat.
This steely, determined, battling midfielder gives away little of his emotions throughout the conversation, his body language varying from leaning forward to slouching back on the sofa, but when he answers, you can feel his pain.
“Yeah,” he sighs. “It wasn’t the best.
“It was a game that we probably could and maybe should have won but it wasn’t meant to be. The fact it ultimately ended up being my last game as captain wasn’t great.”
Jedinak’s path to football came from playing in the back garden and high school playing fields in his childhood home in Rooty Hill, a quiet suburb of Sydney, with his elder brother Matthew. He says “for as long as I can remember,” football is what he wanted to do.
Former Palace defender Tony Popovic, who was their first-team coach at the time, finalised the deal to bring Jedinak to England in 2011.
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“Tony called me and wanted to see what my plans were. I said I was up for a change and was looking to move somewhere like England if it was a possibility,” he says.
“It was different, especially in the cut and thrust of the Championship, which is quite busy and makes you realise how much you have to be prepared. I didn’t have much of a pre-season but they managed my playing time OK and allowed me time to adapt.
“One thing that sort of resonates with me are how the fans are and how loyal they are. Even though it can be turbulent at times, they will stick with the team.
“I put my head down and tried to give it my all, and I’m glad they eventually understood what I was doing. It was a relationship I’ll always be forever grateful for and will be forever in my heart. It was a truly special time in my footballing path.”
Despite Dougie Freedman leaving to join Bolton Wanderers the following season, Jedinak always thought promotion was still achievable.
“I knew I was going to be one of the people who helped deal with it,” he says. “I only wanted to get promotion. I wouldn’t say it to too many people because they would have laughed at me — even the people in the building at the time — because I wasn’t switched on to how the Championship was.
“I soon learned it’s not that easy but I never once believed we didn’t have a chance.”
Self-belief is a common theme and it comes up again when the focus switches to the time spent in the Premier League.
“There was never a question for me about going down. I never ever thought about relegation in my time at Palace. We never once considered relegation,” he says. “We had this togetherness as a group that took us to a place that a lot of people thought was not possible.
“If I felt that something needed to be said in front of the group, we did it as a group. It was our response. We were the ones taking care of results and performances. We could be prepared in a certain way and get advice but, at the end of the day, what we were doing was for each other. I said that once or twice towards the end of the season when it was getting a bit tricky and everyone was starting to question things.
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“It was a case of, ‘Remember who has got us here and who can get us to the end point.'”
During that season, Jedinak would face a spell on the sidelines with an eye socket fracture and a broken nose after a collision with Huddersfield Town and former Palace centre forward Alan Lee — who told The Athletic that he did not elbow the midfielder.
“I got a nice whack to the face that probably was unjustified,” Jedinak says. “What was said after tells me it was unjustified. We’ve seen what happened and how it happened. I understand it happened. Whether it was intentional or not, I know what it was… it was an unnecessary injury that put me out of the team, the game, but it is what it is.
“I won’t hold a grudge against Alan Lee. We both know what happened, there was another person (Palace physio Alex Manos) there. I don’t hate him. I know what he means to Palace people. It is what it is.”
It would be under Ian Holloway that promotion was achieved after he replaced Freedman in November 2012. Victory over Brighton in the play-off semi-finals would be followed by an extra-time win over Watford in the final to secure a route to the Premier League, which Jedinak considers the high point of his Palace career.
“Ollie was very passionate about football. He was infectious and it rubbed off on everyone. He rode all the highs and lows,” he says. “He just allowed us to have a good preparation for the final. He was in the zone with getting everything like suits organised because he had been there before. The time for talking was done during the week. It was time to roll your sleeves up and get the job done.
“The first thing I said after we scored was to refocus. I remember saying, ‘We can’t let this one slip. We’ve got to stay switched on.'”
After realising his dream, reality soon bit hard. Three points from the opening eight Premier League games saw Holloway leave the club. It seemed inevitable but did it feel that way to the players?
“In any situation, you don’t like to think that way. You don’t wish it on anyone but it probably was the right decision at the time,” Jedinak says.
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“I still had the belief that there were not a lot of things we needed. There was a lot of organisation and an approach that was going to make us harder to beat and give us an opportunity to go and score goals as well.”
Tony Pulis would replace Holloway and guide Palace to safety that season before leaving on the eve of the 2014-15 campaign. Neil Warnock took over only to find himself sacked by Christmas, and Pardew was then appointed in the January. All the upheaval had an unsettling impact.
“He (Pulis) was a very experienced manager and someone who liked to do things in a certain way,” says Jedinak. “It was probably something we were more used to but he took it up another level, made us do the best we could and galvanised us as a group. We were all pulling in the right direction and the results picked up.
“You thought you were on to something good then… We didn’t get the best opportunity because we had lost our manager on the eve of the season.”
Despite wanting to extend his stay at Palace, Jedinak enjoyed his time in the Midlands with Villa, where he spent three seasons before being released at the end of his contract in the summer after helping them back to the top flight via the play-offs.
“I would have loved to have played in the Premier League with Villa,” he says. “It was nice to go through that (promotion) and get the club back to where it wants to be.
“It makes you realise how far you can adapt what you need to do. I played a different role at Villa and had to do different things but it was just as important. I see it as a big positive. I’d have liked to stay, but it’s what happens.”
He says that his sons — “a bundle of energy, they like to kick lumps out of each other” — aren’t allowed to support anyone other than Palace or Villa, and reveals he returned to Selhurst Park to watch the 1-0 defeat by Tottenham in April 2017 from the director’s box.
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He also watched the opening of Spurs’ new stadium last season with his two eldest sons and says he would like to take them to Selhurst when they are older.
“Palace is always going to be a special place for me. I’ve been back once but not a lot of people know,” he says. “It was a last-minute thing with my colleague who was a Spurs fan and had tickets in the away section. I’m like, ‘I’m not going with you there. Give me a minute and I’ll arrange something.’
“But because it was so last-minute, it was like, in and out, hat and hoodie on, get on with it.”
As well as his club achievements, Jedinak also has those 79 caps for Australia.
“I was very proud of being able to put the shirt on for the first time in a game and to be part of that for many years was pretty cool,” he says.
“To play for your country, represent them at three World Cups and captain them is a dream come true. It’s an amazing experience. A lot of players don’t get the opportunity to go to a World Cup. It has a different vibe and I would recommend it to people. If they cant do it as professionals, then to go as a spectator.”
Now a free agent after not being picked up following his release by Villa, he is considering a move into coaching and management and is in the process of obtaining his A Licence – but hasn’t given up on extending his playing career just yet.
“I’m still trying to play and still keeping fit. I still hope to get an opportunity somewhere and we will see what happens after that,” he says. “Coaching? Potentially, yeah. Just maybe not right now.
“I still go and use Villa’s training facilities, away from the first team, when they are not there. I do my own thing and crack on. It’s not always the easiest thing but it’s necessary and you need to do it.
“It might be somewhere abroad or within England, I don’t know. It would be nice to be in England. I realise that may not be a possibility, so I can’t not be open to trying somewhere else.
“I’d like to manage. If that was the path I was going down, it would be great to manage. There’s a long road before that but it would be something to try to explore some day.”
(Photo: Catherine Ivill – AMA/Getty Images)
