Winner Coach’s record
Guides Partizan to the Serbian league and cup double.
Leads Watford to promotion to the Premier League at the first attempt.
Having quit Watford, Jokanovic takes Maccabi Tel Aviv to the Champions League group stages for the first time in 11 years.
Takes Fulham into the Premier League after a 1-0 play-off final defeat of Aston Villa at Wembley. the end, I try to interpret everything that happens around me in a positive way. I know I must take this responsibility, but I never cry about my situation. I must understand I have 12 new players and I must start a learning process with them while at the same time fighting for the points.”
Does the money spent add to the pressure? “OK, I try to ignore this kind of situation,” Jokanovic says. “If you want to analyse, you can make comparisons between players, but I don’t want to know the price of a player – £5million, £25 million, £100 million, £150million – I don’t care. If someone costs £30million and can help me, then perfect. But if someone doesn’t cost any money and is working very well then I am going to use this guy.
“Now, I am not a manager. I am a head coach and, sometimes, when you spend money and maybe you put coins in the cake then you can break your teeth! It’s not always the solution. So, I don’t feel pressure [about money spent]. I feel pressure for my work, for results, and I must be respectful of the supporters, the club and the board.”
Jokanovic is open about not all the players being his choices – “welcome to modern football. I am here as the head coach and I have some kind of power, but my word is not the last word” – but is certainly not complaining. This is the job he wants, and cherishes, in the league he wants to be in.
“People pay me for the results,” he says. “I know I must work hard for that. With our start to the season, OK we expected some better performances and some more points, but the expectation from my side is that I need more intensity, I need more concentration, I need more working. I need to build a team that is going to push each other and, in this way, I trust I am going to find a way, a way to make people around us satisfied.
“All the pressure must be pressure for me, I take it on me. I must take it on my back. The players don’t need it. They follow the plan. It’s like when you prepare some coffee. You must put everything in the right order in the cup.” Jokanovic is the first Serb to manage in the Premier League and the first foreign coach to win promotion to the division twice, a source of great pride.
“It’s not usual to find people from my part of Europe working here,” he says. “There was, from the ex-yugoslavia, Slaven Bilic [at West Ham] and Velimir Zajec [at Portsmouth, both Croatian]. It’s not a destination that