[Archived] Difference Between Hughes And Souness

[bazza]

Souness did three things for us:-

1) Promotion

2) Winning the League Cup

3) Bringing Hughes to the club as a player.

I believe that Hughes would not be here now if it wasn't for him playing here, seeing the set-up, the training facilities, the homeliness of the club, winning another cup medal, etc.

So thank you Graeme Souness, not just for Brad, Tugay and MGP, but for Sparky as well.

[waggy]

souness lost the repect off the players,he was like roman emporer lauding over rome problem is it was blackburn.unfortunatley i think sparky will not be here long enough for the milk to sour

[frosty]

Souness did three things for us:-

1) Promotion

2) Winning the League Cup

3) Bringing Hughes to the club as a player.

I believe that Hughes would not be here now if it wasn't for him playing here, seeing the set-up, the training facilities, the homeliness of the club, winning another cup medal, etc.

So thank you Graeme Souness, not just for Brad, Tugay and MGP, but for Sparky as well.

Seconded, it was just his final year (03/04) that put me off him. If he had stayed for 04/05, we would have been relegated.

[Eddie]

Souness did three things for us:-

1) Promotion

2) Winning the League Cup

3) Bringing Hughes to the club as a player.

I believe that Hughes would not be here now if it wasn't for him playing here, seeing the set-up, the training facilities, the homeliness of the club, winning another cup medal, etc.

So thank you Graeme Souness, not just for Brad, Tugay and MGP, but for Sparky as well.

He did quite a few other things as well. We have to remember that he brought Friedel, Tugay, Reid, MGP, Emerton and Neill to the club; all of whom have formed essential parts of Hughes' squad as well as other players who were very good but moved on beforehand. In my opinion he was the right man for the job at the time. He stayed too long, but that doesn't change the fact that he did some very good things for the club. Without him what is happening now wouldn't have been possible.

[joey_big_nose]

Souness was good for us. He spent a fair bit on average players but he did do what many other managers have failed to do- win a cup, establish the team in the league. The problem he seems to have is that he rubs people up the wrong way and is arrogant so cannot correct things if the go wrong.

To be honest Souness is more reviled at the club than his record really merits. It was a good one. The one thing that did really annoy me though is he forced out Cole when clearly he could perform at the top level for another two years.

Hughes is arguably the highest quality manager BRFC has had in the modern period imo.

[Ronin]

Souness did three things for us:-

1) Promotion

2) Winning the League Cup

3) Bringing Hughes to the club as a player.

I believe that Hughes would not be here now if it wasn't for him playing here, seeing the set-up, the training facilities, the homeliness of the club, winning another cup medal, etc.

So thank you Graeme Souness, not just for Brad, Tugay and MGP, but for Sparky as well.

When you look at it like that, you could say that we wouldn't be where we are if it wasn't for Souness then?!

[Eddie]

Souness was good for us. He spent a fair bit on average players but he did do what many other managers have failed to do- win a cup, establish the team in the league. The problem he seems to have is that he rubs people up the wrong way and is arrogant so cannot correct things if the go wrong.

To be honest Souness is more reviled at the club than his record really merits. It was a good one. The one thing that did really annoy me though is he forced out Cole when clearly he could perform at the top level for another two years.

Hughes is arguably the highest quality manager BRFC has had in the modern period imo.

To me the statements you have made don't go together. The vast majority of Souness' purchases were good and if you add up the money he spent to the players brought in I think all would agree that it looks pretty good.

Souness won promotion, won a cup and got a side to finish in the top 6. Now so far Hughes has done won of those things (hopefully he'll never have a chance to achieve the first one). I'm not saying Hughes isn't a very good manager, but to say that Souness is thought of too highly and then to say that a manager who has only one top 6 finish and a couple semi-finals to his name is the greatest in the modern era is a bit out of line. At this stage in the Souness era we all thought he was magnificent, I think we should all wait and see what we achieve this season before we heap too much praise on Hughes.

I'm not being critical of him, don't get me wrong, I'm just saying that everything looks great so far, but it's the final product that counts.

[John]

To me the statements you have made don't go together. The vast majority of Souness' purchases were good and if you add up the money he spent to the players brought in I think all would agree that it looks pretty good.

Souness won promotion, won a cup and got a side to finish in the top 6. Now so far Hughes has done won of those things (hopefully he'll never have a chance to achieve the first one). I'm not saying Hughes isn't a very good manager, but to say that Souness is thought of too highly and then to say that a manager who has only one top 6 finish and a couple semi-finals to his name is the greatest in the modern era is a bit out of line. At this stage in the Souness era we all thought he was magnificent, I think we should all wait and see what we achieve this season before we heap too much praise on Hughes.

I agree - I think it is too easy to criticise Souness because of his character. He did do very well at the time but things got stale for us, as they do under most managers over a period of time. He did actually make some decent value signings as well.

When comparing the two managers, you would have to say Hughes has not had the financial resources Souey had and the Premiership (as a league) is much more competitive now.

We can go on about the differences for a while as they are different types of manager and managed in different eras, but IMO they both have done well for us.

[rover6]

Bearing in mind the relatively weak opposition we faced in reaching the Worthy Cup final and the transfer funds that Souness had to spend to get us out of Div 1 - I do not believe that Souness' achievements there were fantastic. They were decent and should be recognised as such - but not that impressive. I believe him getting us into 6th position was his greatest achievement with Rovers and even there he did have a world class Damien Duff to pick.

When you consider that Iain Dowie took Crystal Palace from the bottom of (more-or-less) Div 1 into the Prem, or Aidy Boothroyd's success with his minute budget at Watford or George Burley taking Ipswich into the UEFA cup, - Souness' achievements are not exactly singular in merit.

Bad or mediocre managers have made the most of their circumstances before and will do in the future. Remember Gerard Houllier and his plastic treble, Peter Reid and his high-flying Sunderland side and even Sven Goran Eriksson with his 'disaster waiting to happen' dressed as a promising team right now.

Imo, just as players have purple patches where they briefly shed their skin of mediocrity (Ricketts, Phillips, Marcus Stewart, etc. etc.), many managers enjoy a period of success but form is temporary and suspect class always comes out in the end. If you look at Souness' managerial career holistically, he is and was a pretty darn mediocre to crap manager whose reputation as a player got him into positions that were well and truly beyond his talents deserved.

If Souness hadn't signed Mark Hughes we might not be the progressive team we are. But likewise, if Brian Kidd hadn't bought Matt Jansen, the same could be said. Imo Souness had a certain capacity to motivate players but the capacious emptiness in his managerial intellect were frighteningly exposed by the end and the horrifying memories of the Genclerbiligi away game amongst others should serve as reminders of how far we've come under Sparky.

[Baz]

For me Souness did wonders for Rovers in the first 3 years but after that we went backwards - and quickly.

He inherited a poor squad but with 3 young starlets in Dunn Duff and Jansen crafted a great attacking team.

The biggest problem for me was his coaching staff and his beliefs that proper players just got on with it. We were so unorganised and unfit towards the end of his time it was embarrassing - there was no way with even another month with Souness at the helm we'd have stayed up again!

Teams used to come to Ewood especially and knew that if they could sit back against the might of Dickov and Stead supplied by the creative Jonathon Douglas and Garry Flitcroft then eventually after an hour or so we'd take off a full back and go 3 at the back - suicide in the Prem. We must have lost 5-6 home games from that tactical masterstroke!

On the plus side Souness did manage to get a number of big name players to come to Ewood - even if he fell out with most of them in the end - Cole, Yorke, Berg - even Dunny!

[rover6]

Imo Souness had a certain capacity to motivate players but the capacious emptiness in his managerial intellect were frighteningly exposed by the end and the horrifying memories of the Genclerbiligi away game amongst others should serve as reminders of how far we've come under Sparky.

For Genc away, see Larissa away...

For all the Hughesy lionising I have been indulging in, I have to say that one criticism of him is that he sticks with the big names too often when they're not doing it. We all remember how nothing would make Hughes play Pedersen - now the reverse is the case, sadly.

[Zulu]

Souness is a bag of @#/? whereas Sparky is a very good manager. Have I missed anything here?

[thenodrog]

Souness is a bag of @#/? whereas Sparky is a very good manager. Have I missed anything here?

Nice to have your thoughts Zulu especially as I thought you might have enough on your plate discussing the relative merits or otherwise of the two fat Sams.

[Hanks]

For Genc away, see Larissa away...

For all the Hughesy lionising I have been indulging in, I have to say that one criticism of him is that he sticks with the big names too often when they're not doing it. We all remember how nothing would make Hughes play Pedersen - now the reverse is the case, sadly.

course he should stick with the same "big names" we were unbeaten were we not?

[thenodrog]

course he should stick with the same "big names" we were unbeaten were we not?

game set and match to hanks.

[ABBEY]

For Genc away, see Larissa away...

For all the Hughesy lionising I have been indulging in, I have to say that one criticism of him is that he sticks with the big names too often when they're not doing it. We all remember how nothing would make Hughes play Pedersen - now the reverse is the case, sadly.

FOR HUGHES ,SEE SOEY

FOR MGP SEE ROVER6

JESUS ROVER6 YOU KNEW BETTER THAN SOEY AND NOW YOU KNOW BETTER THAN SOEY

[neekoy]

Abs, what does that mean?

[ABBEY]

it means when soey was in charge rover6 slagged him all the time and now hugheys is less of a manager and tactician than rover 6 .....oooops just reread my post this morning...can i be excused i wrote in a cold wet wagon over a cuppa.

[Fife Rover]

Abs, what does that mean?

It means he's been too close to the barmaids apron; again!

[rover6]

it means when soey was in charge rover6 slagged him all the time and now hugheys is less of a manager and tactician than rover 6 .....oooops just reread my post this morning...can i be excused i wrote in a cold wet wagon over a cuppa.

Abbey, it's called putting forward an opinion which is rationally argued. It's what this board is for, I hope. I don't expect everyone to agree with what I say but I hope that everyone will acknowledge that I (usually) present my position with some kind of logical argument and am prepared to back it in a amicably orchestrated debate with anyone.

[Hasta]

The one thing I would give Souness over Hughes, and its the only thing and can be outweighed by a zillion other points, is this.

If things weren't working and needed changing then Souness wouldn't wait. He'd often make substitutions at half time or early in the second half whereas sometimes Hughes will wait till there's only 10 or 15 minutes left.

In my view another example of this tonight against Larissa. Once we went a goal down we should have abandoned the 4-5-1. It didnt work at all in the first half and we hardly had a shot. However we continued for the entire first half. Also I just felt that the substitutions and even the Samba upfront in desperation all happened 10 or 15 minutes too late. We wouldn't have gone through anyway but I just felt that from when we went 1-0 down Hughes didnt really help our cause of scoring 4 goals on the night.

[Eddie]

Totally agree.

[brfc fan]

In my view another example of this tonight against Larissa. Once we went a goal down we should have abandoned the 4-5-1. It didnt work at all in the first half and we hardly had a shot. However we continued for the entire first half. Also I just felt that the substitutions and even the Samba upfront in desperation all happened 10 or 15 minutes too late. We wouldn't have gone through anyway but I just felt that from when we went 1-0 down Hughes didnt really help our cause of scoring 4 goals on the night.

Yes probably the only doubt and complaint I have aginst Sparky.

If I had to pick one.

[ihateburnley]

To me I'll always remember Souness' regime for some of the exceptional football we played on the way to the Promotion. I know he didn't buy all the players involved in that team, but he made them a very solid unit that could play some excellent football. He seemed to inspire confidence in the team and encouraged the attacking football we were playing at the time.

Yes, he made some questionable transfers later on in his Rovers career, but overall his transfer dealing were very good. He didn't spend a great deal in the process of getting promoted, and I think the biggest hurdle Souness had was the fact that he was required to replace the likes of Duff which in fairness was never to be achieved.

Like most have already mentioned, both managers were the right choices at the right times. Yes Hughes has made us into a quality side but let's not do an injustice to the man that did a lot for our club.

[tcj_jones]

The one thing I would give Souness over Hughes, and its the only thing and can be outweighed by a zillion other points, is this.

If things weren't working and needed changing then Souness wouldn't wait. He'd often make substitutions at half time or early in the second half whereas sometimes Hughes will wait till there's only 10 or 15 minutes left.

I agree with that, when we are trailing in a game, I feel Hughes often leaves it too late to make a change. It is the only criticism I have of him as a manager.