Martinez left Sousa with a good team & some good , inexpensive players , a good style & 4 million in the coffers . Did any of the reasonably expensive players Sousa brought in even play much & Paulo caused a lot of hard feelings amongst the players & board . Another manager might have got us to the playoffs with what Roberto left IMO .
Was sousa allowed to spend £4m ?? er, no! Those payments were spread over a couple of years and were used more for buck than sousa, im not saying Sousa was the answer but he was a very important part of where we are now, RM has proved he has a blind spot,he cant seem to make his teams hard to beat and coheisive, which tells me that he was very lucky having a great base of talent to work with at swansea,he also knew every strength and weakness of the swans players before he took the job,it gave him a massive advantage as he didnt need to use the square pegs in round holes approach. Good luck to RM but we all knew the prem league was too early for him,it wont be a suprise to see hi relegated
Cracker .... I think you have rose colored soecs for some of our players of the time. Another manager would have got us relegated. We were starting that season with projected goal difference deficit of more than -23. Teams with that goal difference deficit are relegated - it's a fact. Sousa had to deal with that, overcame it and almost got us into the play-offs. Remember .... One of the jokers he had to deal with was an over the hill Trundle and all the neophytes inside and outside the club that couldn't understand why the "messiah" was not being played. Supposedly there were frictions - so what. What Sousa accomplished with what he inherited was technically brilliant and I doubt anybody else coud have achieved what he did and leave his successor with a better platform on which to build than he inherited. Rogers took what Sousa left, added to it and got promoted. Sousa had no goal sorers in the squad when he arrived - Wigan / Martinez had gutted the club of them - Scotland, Gomez gone, and Bodde was injured. Tarnish Sousa if you like with non-football stuff, but from a purely techncal, football point of view he was brilliant.
Martinez got just about nothing after reaching the Championship , couldn't even secure the signing of Anderson . Roberto brought in Gower on the free , brilliant. Gomez on a 200,000 loan (I think ) , brilliant . Dyer for 350,000 , super brilliant . Dobbie , for 250,000 & Buck showed Sousa what a great Championship signing Dobbie was , a player Sousa sent out on loan . Sousa benching of Britton made me think at one time Paulo was mentally challenged frankly . Projected goal difference ? . No comment ! 4 million was coming in eventually for Martinez & Scotland , so Sousa was allowed to waste a bit of money pretending he knew what to do with it , Huw never gave him a chance to spend anymore after players like Lopez , Cotterial & wasn't Beattie another one . Might even be more wasted money on players , I just can't remember . Martinez had a +13 & Sousa had a + 3 .
I agree that Sousa did a fantastic job as far as sorting us out defensively was concerned but god we were boring to watch. Although a technically gifted manager I'm not convinced his tactics were as brilliant as you suggest, YJ. Sousa just told everyone to defend, even the strikers. Poor old Pintado spent most of his time in his own half. That's why, despite achieving our highest position in 23 years at the time we were the Division's lowest scorers by some margin. But I think every manager in recent times has contributed to where we are now, and Sousa is no exception, whatever you think of him.
Agreed, from an entertainment point of view Sousa's product was not pretty, but we wouldn't have been happy with pretty but relegated. It's an interesting parallel with Wigan. Wigan are trying to be pretty and play pretty football, but the only thing they are accomplishing is being pretty awful results wise and the Wigan crowd are hating it. Perhaps Martinez has stayed one season too long. If they had replaced Maryinez with a Sousa-esque manager for ths season they would have been dull and boring but safe and better prepared financially to build for the future.
Norway, I get mental images of you in a frenzied stupor during games racking up loads of thoughts, before expunging them all in a tirade not long after full time!
Ha ha Norway, are you the new Daiswan?? good moan there mate, keep it up, more like this we need, regarding Wigan, they don't call him dodge Dave for nowt!...................
With the Chelsea manager getting sacked & the assistant taking over till summer , the chances of Buck going jn the summer & Roberto coming back just went to 15 % Norway Lol !!
I've heard through the grape vine that Jenkins and Sousa are now best of mates, after a chance meeting at the Fulham game back in December?? they have clearly kissed and made up, so we could even get Sousa back!................. please log in to view this image
Jenkins might have been polite to Paulo but he wouldn't let him anywhere near the club again , Mrs. Jenkins didn't raise stupid kids . If he does bring Sousa back , I'll buy Musty a season ticket !!
