WIN, lose or draw at Oxford on Saturday, it’ll still be a red letter day for Newport County AFC boss Justin Edinburgh.

A trip to a struggling outfit looking on the back of an unbeaten run of eight League Two games is exciting enough, but the road to the Kassam Stadium will be lined with nostalgia for Edinburgh as he celebrates his three-year anniversary as Exiles manager.

He took charge on October 4, 2011 when he was appointed by Chris Blight, winning out on the recommendation of Tim Harris from over 40 applicants with County in real trouble.

The feel good factor that came with a phenomenal campaign in which Dean Holdsworth took Newport out of the Conference South with record points had long since faded and Holdsworth departed for pastures new with Newport crumbling.

They went from promotion candidates in their debut season in the Conference to mid-table fodder with Harris in a caretaker capacity for an unnecessarily long period and then made the wrong choice with the appointment of Anthony Hudson, a good coach and potentially a fantastic manager, but not someone familiar with the rough and tumble of English football’s non-league scene.

Hudson signed the wrong players after the Exiles had already diluted the quality of their squad in their first Conference campaign and by the end of September they were bottom of the league and looking like relegation certainties.

Edinburgh’s task on arrival – and let’s be fair, Harris can’t take too much credit for his appointment, he had easily the best credentials of any out of work manager interested in the post – was simple, survival.

I wasn’t overly confident the Exiles would be able to beat the drop and the fact that they did and managed to take in a first ever trip to Wembley – albeit a losing one – was an incredible icing on the cake. There is no doubt at all in hindsight that the Trophy Final galvanised people behind the County more so even than promotion and Wembley again 12 months later.

The ex-Spurs defender was able to take the momentum from Wembley and survival to begin shaping the squad in his own image and he began exhibiting what is probably his single best trait as a manager, the ability to extract an awful lot out of players other people don’t want.

Cases in point are too numerous to mention but I’ll throw in a few names, Lenny Pidgeley, Andy Sandell, Ismail Yakubu, Max Porter, Mike Flynn, Lee Minshull, Robbie Willmott, Danny Crow, Aaron O’Connor and well, you get my drift. Part of Edinburgh’s longevity has been that he’s right far more than he’s wrong with signings.

The circumstances of County’s promotion – surviving a winter so savage it could’ve been written by George R.R Martin, as brothers Sandell, Pipe and Yakubu battled the elements in wildling territory three times a week for a month – with many teething problems from the Edinburgh driven switch to Rodney Parade, were spectacular.

County lost their two key performers in Max Porter and Aaron O’Connor and Edinburgh filled the void, signing Christian Jolley on his terms and deploying loan signing Alex Gilbey to take over the mantle from the departed Lee Evans.

They went to Grimsby and played a total shadow side with the play-offs secured, Edinburgh a wily poker player unwilling to show his hand with the same opponents set to be County’s semi-final foes. The Exiles peaked to perfection in those games and held their nerve against Welsh rivals Wrexham in a contest that meant everything.

Newport County AFC are now a League Two side and though they’ve yet to properly establish themselves – in over 50 games they’ve only shown promotion or relegation form with nothing in between – they are set for at worst another consolidation season in my estimation.

County are playing attractive football at a proper stadium in the Football League in front of crowds that could be better, but are still never worse than 2,500. It’s light years away from where they were when I started writing this column – incidentally by trolling Cardiff City well before trolling was a thing – when they were the team that finished ninth in the Conference South and who played at Spytty Park in front of 800 people.

Edinburgh hasn’t just transformed County’s fortunes on the field; he’s attempted to affect positive change off it, driving the move away from Spytty Park, arguing passionately for training facilities within the county or city and focusing far more on the youth side of the club. Discovering the new Lee Evans or signing the next Conor Washington is a lot easier if you’ve got the conviction to play them in the first team.

The newest pet project of Edinburgh’s appears to be forging stronger links with Cardiff and Swansea City with the idea being that Newport is the ideal environment for their young players and this is another smart move from a manager who is, in modern day terms, in this for the long haul.

Edinburgh has turned down the opportunity to talk about vacant jobs at Swindon, Oxford, Luton and Portsmouth on his way to becoming the 12th longest serving manager in English football and he remains as infectiously enthusiastic about leaving a long-term legacy within the city of Newport as he was in 2011.

Newport County AFC and Edinburgh have been a perfect pairing and while no football marriage lasts forever, when we think back to the Hudson regime, it’s hard not to look at the past three years as an extended honeymoon period.

Edinburgh is already one of the three best managers in Newport County’s history – pre and post 1989 – and now it’s up to him to write a few more chapters to a splendid story.