We never had one offer for Le Tiss!

DAVE JONES: MAGICIAN’S FITNESS COST HIM MOVE

DAVE JONES’ time as boss at Southampton and Wolves was a tale of the one that got away, the one that didn’t – and the one that really should have.

The Merseysider made a fond trip down memory lane this week, recalling two clubs which he left in a better state than he found them.

The common thread running through the six years in all Jones spent at St Mary’s and Molineux was in the rapid changes he made to both dressing rooms.

And in terms of the one that should have got away, there are few surprises for guessing who that was – but perhaps for different reasons than many might think.

Jones said: “It may surprise people but throughout my time at Southampton – three seasons – I never had one offer for Matt Le Tissier. I never understood why.

“Matt was a magician – unbelievable. We would stop and just applaud him in training. Some of it had to be seen to be believed.

“But then, you’d see the goalkeepers lapping him in training when the players were running around the pitches – he never had a dedication to fitness.

“If he could have found that, then he would have got his move.

“He had the ability. He could have played for another five years at the top, easily.

“I never understood either why Glenn Hoddle never gave him more international caps. It was a strange one. But as a person, a man and a player, Le Tiss was fantastic.”

The ‘one that didn’t get away’ was also at St Mary’s – although the late Dean Richards was a defender Wolves fans will also look back on with affection.

“The criteria for me going to Southampton [ from Stockport in 1997] in the first place was to dismantle an old team,” added Jones, “And I pinched Deano from Wolves [on a free transfer in 1999].

“It was one of the strangest transfers of my career. I was stood at Manchester airport, waiting for a flight to Southampton and I spotted Dean in the airport.

“He was on his way to speak to Middlesbrough. I convinced him to join me. I bought him a ticket and he jumped on the plane. He never left my sight and we got our man.

“I never told the Saints chairman, Rupert

Lowe, what I was doing. I also signed

Paul Jones from Stockport, and never told him about that, either.

“He made millions out of Dean [who went to Tottenham for £8.1million in 2001] and had years of good service out of Jonah.” Jones made a premature exit from Southampton in 2000 – he was fighting a court battle, and was cleared of all charges against him.

Saints’ loss was to be Wolves’ gain a year later – and Jones (left) got them back to the top flight in 2003. It might have happened sooner had he snared another magician, in the shape of Paul Merson – the big fish that got away. Jones said: “When I took over as manager at Wolves, the club had something like 39 professionals.

“I remember once sitting on a hill that overlooked the training ground with the chairman. I told him that he needed seven players. ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘I thought you’d ask for more than that’.

“‘No,’ I replied, ‘that’s what you KEEP out of that lot.’

“I couldn’t see a team – and I knew something was wrong when I found out, halfway through the season, that a whole host of them had booked holidays once the season finished. Not after the play-offs, but the day after the league programme was over. That wasn’t right.

“I tried to sign Merson, only that failed and Merse took Portsmouth up instead. We eventually got promoted anyway, but we might have done it sooner.

“Harry Redknapp’s a good pal of mine and he said that Merse effectively got them up. There’s no doubt in my mind he’d have done the same for us.”