By John Powell – GlobalTV.com

Thomas, the music executive, is singing the blues about the end of his Survivor journey. The fourth boot of the season was the victim of a tribal swap and a hidden immunity idol that formed a duet to end what was a very promising Survivor run.

John Powell: You got to watch everything back last night. How you feeling this morning?

Thomas Krottinger: I feel so good. I feel overwhelmed. I feel like the luckiest fourth boot in the history of Survivor, if I’m being honest with you. (laughs)

John Powell: I believe in the old saying: ‘If you want something done right, you do it yourself.’ Do you wish you would have searched the bag instead?

Thomas Krottinger: I mean, now understanding how I was being perceived already as a little villainous, I kind of wished I leaned in to that especially since…Shocking! No offence! Bro sucked at that bag search but I was trying to lay that at his feet, if that makes sense. You can be the person that searches the bag. You can be the person that makes your target bigger. I will be a little innocent. As it turns out no one thought that. So, yeah, I should have just done it myself.

John Powell: There’s always a big controversy when players search through other people’s belongings. Where do you stand on all of that?

Thomas Krottinger: I mean, I guess I’m fine with that. I feel like in the beginning of Survivor it felt very personal, like crossing a line but I think we’re on season 48 and I feel like bag searches are very much a thing now and as a player you should anticipate that. I never left my advantage in my bag. It was in my pocket, in my underwear, you would have to cavity search me to find me find that piece of paper. (laughs) That’s kind of why I wasn’t even that interested in the bag search with Shauhin because I knew Kyle was really smart and he was lying to me about a lot. I didn’t think he’d be dumb enough to leave the idol in his shoe. (laughs)

John Powell: Why did you play your advantage at tribal?

Thomas Krottinger: The reason I didn’t play it is because my alliance with the boys was very important to me and it had been made such a big deal by Kyle and Kamilla that I would lying. I had to double down on the fact that I wasn’t in order to keep them with me before we went to the challenge. Then after the challenge, I was sitting there and I was like: ‘If I use my advantage, maybe the three of us get through tribal but our trust is gone.’ I wasn’t ready to just crater that alliance. Joe is the Titanic. He is strong but he’s hard to turn and Shauhin is the puppy dog who can get spooked. So, I think dropping that is like hitting an iceberg and thunder hitting the pug. Do you know what I mean? It’s like, maybe we survive but it disrupts things and I think it f—s up my game in the long-run.

John Powell: You were back into a corner because of advantages and twists. How do you feel about them?

Thomas Krottinger: I’m of two different minds about it. I’m an old school player. I prefer to know where they are than to have them. I had both when I was on Lagi. I was getting all the info from literally everybody. That’s why if there was no swap and we went to tribal, basically, what Shauhin and I wanted to do is what would have happened. But when they’re everywhere in the game it does just change the calculus of things, right?

I couldn’t trust what Kamilla and Kyle were saying to me. I knew Kamilla was lying about her journey the way she explained it, based on what I got out of Bianca. I knew Bianca wasn’t lying to me. It was just like all the information from them was b——t, if you ask me. I knew I was going to go home if Kyle had an idol. That was in my brain. That’s a one in six. So, do I blow the California Girls to avoid a one-in-six shot. I decided to, in theory, if he didn’t have an idol, set myself up to go far into the game with the with the Girls.

John Powell: What was the thinking behind targeting Kyle and not Kamilla?

Thomas Krottinger: Kyle and Kamilla were brilliant. I wanted to go after Kamilla so badly the moment she told me her favorite players were Philip and Q. I was like: ‘We have a problem. This girl is chaos, chaos with ‘K’. I can’t work with that. I don’t know what she’s going to do.’ Kyle was like: ‘I’m Civa strong! I’m always gonna be loyal to Civa.’…The boys were so triggered by Kyle and his energy and he was smart.

John Powell: Were you surprised by Shauhin’s reaction to you wanting to mess things up for Star?

Thomas Krottinger: His reaction and his confessional did surprise me. I said that because we were having nefarious chats about taking Eva out behind Joe’s back, which feels like way crazier than eliminating the person that we all want out of the game. I’m mafia, right? You’re in the family or you’re not and if you’re coming for my family, yeah, you’re dead. That’s why I was like: “This is just a solution to our problem. Let’s just make this easy.

John Powell: Is there anything about your journey you wish fans would have seen?

Thomas Krottinger: I think there’s a narrative about how Lagi didn’t like Star and that’s not true. I think that obviously Star went after the idol, which creates tension. I love Lagi. I feel so lucky that it was the six of us and I wish there was more moments of that being shown. The California Girls got a lot of air time and that’s so f——g cool but I do think that there’s an element to how f—–g smart Bianca is and how great she is…You don’t see as much of her but she had information that she would bring me. She was so active and just brilliant and wonderful out there.

Then, we did on the bonfire and it was on the Fourth of July. That’s why we made the bonfire to begin with. I wish that was shown. We sang ‘America, the Beautiful’ and The Star Spangled Banner as a tribe. It was cute.

John Powell: You deviousness got cut short. Would you ever play again if asked?

Thomas Krottinger: I would get on a boat or plane right now! This game changed my life. I am a different person after playing the game and got so much out of it. I would do it again in a heartbeat. Are you kidding me?

Survivor 48 Fantasy Tribe