‘The aim is to build an energetic team. We want as many young attacking players in as possible’
STOKE City joint-chairman John Coates, chief executive Tony Scholes and manager Michael O’neill sat for 90 minutes to talk about the club’s recent past, present and future.
Fans had submitted ‘hundreds and hundreds’ of questions for an annual event which had to be held virtually this time and they got through a good chunk, addressing subjects ranging from lockdown and contracts to tactics and ambition.
HOW HAS THE CLUB HANDLED ITSELF DURING THE PANDEMIC? Tony Scholes:
First of all we look at it from a group perspective and John is probably better to pick up from that aspect.
John Coates: We try to take our policies across the whole group, which very importantly includes the football club.
I suppose at the outset we made some key decisions about how we address the pandemic with regard to no redundancies, no cuts in pay... we were going to avoid trying to seek any Government help such as the furlough scheme whether that be with staff or players.
I think staff took comfort in that and were then able to deal with a very difficult situation with more certainty. I think that was a real positive. Clearly there was an expense to that, but one as a group we were willing to deal with. Tony Scholes: It’s been tough for everybody and it’s no different at the football club.
The sporting side, everything down at the training ground with first team and under-23s, has carried on apart from those early days, that first six to eight weeks. Ironically it’s put more pressure on staff, the same number of games in a short time.
Up here at the stadium, the revenue side of the club, I’m afraid has been pretty non-existent for most of this period.
We’ve been fortunate that not only was the commitment made from the group to support staff right the way through the pandemic and support them in their wages but also we redeployed a number of staff to bet365 - 21 in total - which means here at the stadium we’re operating on much smaller numbers.
They are numbers to ensure that supporters always have a point of contact and we’ve continued to get a lot of communication from supporters.
There was a big campaign early doors to make phone calls to provide support to the older supporters, just to check that things were ok with them and give them a familiar voice.
Everyone at the club got involved in that. More than 3,000 calls were made.
We’ve dealt with it as everyone has tried, as best as we are able.
DID YOU TRY TO KEEP THINGS LIGHT HEARTED FOR PLAYERS DURING THAT FIRST LOCKDOWN? Michael O’neill:
It was difficult at the outset because we went into lockdown but we had no end, we didn’t know when we would be allowed to train again.
One week runs into two weeks and suddenly it’s eight, nine, 10 weeks before we could get back to a point when we might consider training again.
There were periods in that when I thought we might not restart but we had to keep players focused to be ready, without a definitive date.
From our point of view, the club gave us everything they could. Richard Smith and his team were fantastic.
We had to get outside marquees to create gyms because of what we weren’t allowed to do.
We had to eat outside, we had to provide that.
It was easier to do it over the summer when the weather was better and I think the players were really grateful for the support of the group, the family, that they took away the uncertainty.
I think that was really important to players in terms of contracts.
Secondly, the support we gave to make sure the team maintained its place in the Championship. Quite quickly we had to adhere to similar guidelines for the whole of this season.
It’s not been easy playing in empty stadiums, it’s not been easy travelling in two coaches and at times staying in very empty soulless hotels when were the only ones there.
But we’ve had everything we could have asked to make sure the level of performance is what it should be at this level.
IF THE SEASON WAS TO FINISH TOMORROW WOULD YOU BE HAPPY WITH A MID-TABLE FINISH? Michael O’neill:
I wouldn’t say I would be happy. I said at the outset of the season that I felt we needed to be in the top half of the table and hopefully then make inroads into the top six.
We’ve basically been in the top half for the whole season. Unfortunately we haven’t been in the top six for long enough.
I think we’ve been in and out of it on a few occasions but haven’t been able to really push to get into the top six.
There have been a number of reasons for that. I think injuries have played a part and it’s been a challenge at times with the players we’ve had out.
I think we had a period when we lost a bit of momentum in terms of winning games, we drew too many games as well.
What we have done is introduced a number of younger players in the team. For Stoke City I think the profile of the team has changed.
I looked just this week that for players under 23 years of age, we’ve had the most minutes in the Championship.
People look at other teams and look at Barnsley or even Luton but we’ve had the most minutes in the Championship for under-23 players.
I think that’s probably been a factor as well because for a number of those players it’s been their first sustained season in the Championship. I think we’ll be stronger for that next season.
HOW DOES MICHAEL O’NEILL WANT STOKE TO PLAY? DO YOU HAVE A PHILOSOPHY LIKE BIELSA OR GUARDIOLA? Michael O’neill:
We have a clear philosophy on how we want to play. It’s not a word I particularly like in football to be honest!
We want a team that can play and I think people who have watched us this season will have seen - we want to be a team that
is more possession based. We’ve built the game from the back a lot better.
I think that has been helped by the change in goalkeeper, Harry Souttar coming into the team has helped us in that respect, John Obi Mikel coming into central midfield has helped us in that respect.
I think some of performances have been good particularly against the stronger teams in the league.
Unfortunately we just haven’t had enough to win those games. I look at games here for example against Bournemouth, against Watford when for a big, big portion of the games it was good but we came up a little bit short.
We know how we want to play. We want to build an energetic team. We want to get as many young attacking players in the team as possible and as many athletic players in the team as possible. That’s key, I think in the Championship as well.
I think we’re going in the right direction.
People make a lot out of systems. I think it’s very important in the Championship to be able to be flexible.
We’ve signed players with a view to playing 4-3-3 but we’ve had to look at that and reflect on that when Tyrese got injured. We’ve looked comfortable at times in a 3-4-3 or 3-5-2 system.
One thing about this league is you do need to have that flexibility. When we go away to Cardiff and you find a very direct game and you have to deal with a lot of direct play that you have the ability to change your system. I think we’ve adapted to that well.
We have a clear direction on the way we want to go and obviously how we want the team to play.
A LOT OF CONTRACTS EXPIRING IN THE NEXT 18 MONTHS, DOES THIS SIGNAL A SHIFT IN STRATEGY? Tony Scholes:
I guess, first of all, it was a statement rather than a question and it’s true - there are a number of contracts that expire and more so in June 22 than June 21.
Is it an indicator of a shift in strategy? I think as you go further down the leagues, contracts tend to be shorter.
If you look at League One and League Two sides they’ll operate mostly on 12 or 24-month contracts where in the Premier League they tend to be longer as they are protecting the asset value.
So it’s a little bit of us moving from the Premier League to the Championship.
There’s also, to be honest, the pandemic effect. It’s had a devastating effect on the market that clubs are genuinely scared of investing in players and putting players on long contracts because no-one knows where the market is going to go.
We’ve seen in the last couple of
transfer windows that not a lot of activity has taken place. Perhaps our situation reflects the wider market to a degree.
But that’s not to say that everyone in the squad is on short-term contracts. A number of players and I can talk about the young players - Tyrese, Harry (Souttar), Nathan (Collins), Joe Bursik - have all signed long-term contracts to make sure we have the solid backbone of the team going forward.
WHEN DO YOU BELIEVE THIS SQUAD WILL BE WHERE YOU WANT TO BE TO PUSH FOR PROMOTION? Michael O’neill:
As soon as possible to be honest... but I have to be realistic about that as well.
We have a period of time for players’ contracts to expire. A number of those players are not currently at the club, they’re out on loan. Like anything, that affects what we can do in the transfer market.
We had to be quite strategic last summer. Since I’ve come to the club we’ve spent money on three players: Alfie Doughty, who is 21, Jordan Thompson, who we signed at 23, and Jacob Brown at 21, 22.
When we’ve spent money we’ve invested it in potential, in assets.
The older players that we’ve signed - John Obi, James Chester, Steven Fletcher - have come in on a different type of contract, a shorter contract. We feel they are at the scale which can help the team.
At this minute in time we probably have a bit of a void in our squad of players between the ages of 23 to 28 and that’s where we need to get to; more players in our squad of that age and more players possibly in our team of that age. Then we’ll be in a stronger position to challenge.
That has been one of the challenges we’ve faced in a shorter season.
We’ve asked a lot of John Obi, Joe Allen when he’s come back, James Chester, Steven Fletcher when he hasn’t had the one or two injuries.
They’ve had to play a lot of football and they’ve had to play a lot of three-game weeks. The demands are extremely high.
As we go through this period and players’ contracts start to expire we’ll be in a stronger position to build a team in the right way we want.
It doesn’t mean that we don’t believe we can’t do that in the interim period as well.