[Archived] Hughes Signs New Deal

[Sandiway Blue]

Do you really think the England job holds that much appeal?

As Sven put it himself, "to be the England manager you must win every game, not do anything in your private life and hopefully not earn too much money. They are the only qualities you need and if you have those, you are perfect."

It's kind of limiting and it's absolutely true. Sven had an amazing games won:lost ratio but people were constantly on his back about him earning too much money (a contract noone was particularly upset about when the FA offered it to him to begin with) and cheap papers twisted his words and constantly cast him in bad light. I think the England job used to have great appeal because we have some great footballers but the British press now puts most people off.

More the reason for giving the job to Mourinho,he can handle anything the English media can throw at him.

[philipl]

Hughes- Rovers to get stronger

Also keeping secrets on the training ground.

[Eddie]

No he can't. All he'll do is ###### people off. Mourinho wouldn't be able to handle the constant attention. Yes, he enjoyed having the spotlight on him when he wanted it, but if you notice he doesn't like having people bother him when it isn't what he planned.

[philipl]

Hughes on keeping the squad fresh and not being able to pick everybody all the time

[John]

Full Mark Hughes interview with the League Managers Association here.........

[philipl]

Hughes discussing selection policy with ITV

[USABlue]

I do like the one sentence he says in his denial of the clause, "I am happy with the job I've got"

[philipl]

I think Hughes has a bit of a crisis on his hands.

He made great play of stability and emphasising that pl,ayers have to win their place back in the side.

The result of this was on Sunday even a Manager as limited as Curbishley anticipated and set a team and tactics to ruthlessly expose the limitations of a Dunn, Tugay, Mokoena, MGP midfield and got his win as a result in a match which would not have been difficult to get our lads foaming at the mouth for (last year's injustices).

In fact you could argue we got out-managed in all three home defeats but all credit to Sparky as he went with tactics to Pompey in the League Cup that 'arry could not handle.

Dalglish was also a one for stability but particularly away from home he used to come up with line-ups and tactics which were a surprise to everyone and often yielded very comfortable away wins. I struggle to remember KD being out-smarted by opposition managers.

The other problem is that the Axe has got a lot of criticism for Sunday's performance but he was only out there for 45 minutes. If anything Sav was as bad in the second half so it could genuinely be the case that this time Sav is coming back very slowly from his operation.

Having made a big issue of it being difficult to get back into the starting XI, Sparky has made a bit of a rod for his own back now over refreshing the side.

[John]

What concerns me is that we have had a fully fit squad for a number of weeks now. Granted there have been suspensions and players coming back to fitness, but nothing like we experienced last season in terms of players being unavailable.

We always seem to hear from Hughes how strong our squad is. If that is indeed the case then surely Hughes would have more confidence in dropping/resting players. I suppose you want to keep your defence unchanged for as long as possible, but how long can you keep allowing mistakes to be made.

There also seems to be indecision in team selection as well which is never good (when you do not know your best team).

I am getting fed up with the line, I will pick a team to win certain games. It does not appear to be working very well for us at the moment. We are currently going through a typical situation whereby every defensive mistake leads to an opposition goal. You see it all the time with teams who are struggling at the wrong end of the table, and obviously it negatively affects the whole team (confidence wise and ultimately results).

I am sure we will come out of this rut. It will probably will be a “lucky” goal which finally wins us a game, but cannot help feel annoyed and down about recent our recent performances/results.

For the neutral this month, it would have been a great month to show the nation what a good team we supposedly are (as we are on Sky TV on numerous occasions).

Maybe we just have to accept that we will not be good enough for the top 6-8.

Overall, a bit of a rambled post but I find myself possibly over-analysing why we have done so bad recently. We have to remember that Hughes is still a relatively young manager and he is going to make mistakes. Hughes is a stubborn man, I just hope he reflects on this period and learns from the recent errors he has made.