Graham Potter interview: Finding joy with Sweden after Chelsea, West Ham woe, and unlocking Viktor Gyokeres and Alexander Isak at World Cup

It is more than two months since Viktor Gyokeres's 89th-minute goal sealed Sweden's extraordinary World Cup play-off victory over Poland at a delirious Strawberry Arena in Stockholm, but Graham Potter is still finding new ways to enjoy it.

"If you go to YouTube, you can watch the Swedish commentary. I didn't see it at the time but I looked at it a couple of months afterwards. Just the emotion in the voice. Then Viktor scores and it's like an out-of-body experience. I can only describe it as that.

"All our subs are just literally running on the pitch. There are 15 players on the pitch and I'm thinking, 'That's yellow cards, that's problems.' But, of course, it's a World Cup, so all the rules are out the window, you know? The feeling in the stadium was just incredible."

Potter had never experienced jubilation like it. "The best night of my career." How did he celebrate? He smiles. "Got f****** p****d! You have to deal with the down times in football and then enjoy the times when it goes your way and you're maybe a bit lucky."

The result is that Sweden, who finished bottom of their qualifying group, needing the lifeline of their Nations League performance to even take one of the four play-off spots, are now gearing up for only their second World Cup appearance since 2006.

It is huge for the country. "From an economic perspective, from an aspirational perspective, for the kids," adds Potter, their head coach and now national hero, who, having only taken the job in October, is realising a childhood dream of his own.

"Obviously we know how times have changed, but my first football memory is '86, 11 years old, watching Diego Maradona rip football up. That's when I started to go, 'Wow, this is amazing.'

"Back in those days, the World Cup was the only time you could see football on the telly, apart from maybe the FA Cup. As a kid, that's where I started. So, to get the chance to experience that and to work in that environment, it's a dream."

Potter's last two club roles, with Chelsea and West Ham, ended unhappily. But he has extended his contract with Sweden to 2030 and, over the course of nearly an hour in his company in central London, it is clear he has been reinvigorated by his new position.

It was of course in Sweden, during a spell in charge of Ostersunds, that his career took off. Pep Guardiola later described him as the best English manager. He might be crossing the Atlantic as England boss this summer had things worked out differently.

But there is no doubting the authenticity of his feelings for Sweden. "Two of my kids were born in Sweden," he says. "I had seven unbelievable years there, memories that will stay with me for life. I've got an incredible amount to be grateful to the country for.

"For seven years it was my home. And now I'm working for the Swedish FA and I'm the head coach of the national team, so I feel very Swedish." He jokes that he looks Swedish too, although it doesn't help him avoid the attention of fans in the street. "I've got one of those faces that gets recognised, which is not a positive thing," he chuckles.

He will sing their national anthem at the tournament and recalls the emotion of hearing it for the first time as head coach. "Really in the stomach. It's surprising. I think it's because you're aware that you're doing something for more than you. It's a bigger thing.

"The players and everybody connected with the team, if they weren't there, they would be supporting the team. That's the feeling you have. So, you can feel the intensity and the emotion is different, and I think that's what's beautiful about it.

"To be part of what we have achieved is amazing. It's so nice to have experienced that positivity through football because obviously recently I haven't had too much of that, so it's nice on a human level."

As well as reopening his eyes to the beauty of football, the Sweden job is giving Potter a chance to rebuild his career. His sacking from West Ham in September, his second in two and a half years after Chelsea, was a low point which prompted introspection.

"Of course, you have to reflect on all these things that happen and try to put everything in perspective," he explains.

"But then sometimes in football, you just can't rationalise it, so you just go, 'OK, well, maybe it wasn't meant to be.'