Roy Hodgson
Were you pleasantly surprised by the honesty of the performance?
Yea, I don’t know that I expected to see anything other than an honest performance really. But I think the players could have been forgiven if they weren’t able to produce that performance. I think that’s what I was really trying to say. But I thought, the honesty today, the integrity, the work ethic, so many players who’ve hardly played a game during my time at the club, so many so called important players for the club not available on this occasion and play against the team, of course, that had an awful lot to play for, really with the knife of their throat in terms of needing points to avoid relegation, I thought that we dealt with that aspect extremely well. And I think we can come away saying that we deserved that point today.
Were you happy to end the run of defeats at home without so many key players?
I’ve got to say, I think the structure of our team for quite a long while, the sort of shape of the team has been okay. Even verging on quite good at times. But unfortunately, we’ve had this propensity to make important mistakes, which have led to teams scoring goals against us without necessarily dominating us, you know, for long periods of the game. And tonight, yeah, there were a few mistakes as well. But nothing like the ones perhaps that have cost us points in the past games. And I’m really pleased about that, because it would have been a bit sad if a performance of that type had been punished by someone missing a pass, or missing a tackle, on or doing something which we can all understand is not the right thing to do. And that question, again, that would have been a bit sad, because I think the players and the way they went about trying to win the game tonight was absolutely the right way. And it was obviously very much appreciated by the crowd. So that was also an important facto, I thought. I didn’t quite know how many people would turn up to the game tonight. You couldn’t really blame them if they voted with their feet. You know, we don’t see you ever win at home. We’ve seen a lot of defeats, we don’t want to come. But they did come, didn’t they? And not only did they come, they supported us in an extremely good way. And maybe that’s what encouraged the players too, because the players on their part gave something in return and showed that they are a team that really is not far away from being a good Premiership team. But it hasn’t worked out for us this year.
What do you think of Rob Edwards being named as your successor?
I mean, I think the direction is probably quite sensible. Well, I mean, they’ve obviously appointed a very talented young coach. I know exactly what he’s done at Forest Green, and I know the success he’s had there. And I think that maybe that will be a good move for the club. I haven’t had any input into the direction that club should take. But if you asked me, does it seem to me like a good direction? I would definitely say: yes, it does. And all I can do is wish him well. And I hope if he’s seen the game tonight, he would have seen enough in that group tonight. And knowing perhaps a little bit about the players who aren’t anywhere near the team tonight, to believe that I can get this team back into the Premiership.
How big a job is he walking into, what kind of club is he joining?
He’s coming to a club that had good spells in the Premiership. Unfortunately, in the last four seasons, they’ve been up, down, up and now down. So I suppose you could argue that the moment we’re in that yo-yo situation. But if you go back a little bit further, the club had a much longer and a much more secure spell in the Premiership. I think the structure of the club, everything that he will find here, will be everything a coach could wish to find – in terms of the facilities, in terms of the way the club is set up to provide help to the coach in terms of the sports science and nutrition, all of those modern things which are so important. Our club is as good as any out there in that respect. And what I hope also he’ll find is a group of players who will be stung by the fact that they weren’t able to keep the club in the division this year, alongside the coaches that they’ve had. But next year, they will be determined to show that they are actually better than maybe they’ve been able to show it times this season, that this performance of this and this talent will help the new coach, work with them and get them back into the Premier League.
Did that level of performance from the players who’ve been on the fringes send a little bit of a message to those players who weren’t able to play?
I would like to think so. I would like to think so. If I was one of those players not able to play tonight, and one of the players who have been flagged up as the players who are going to keep this team in the Premiership, that’s certainly how I would be feeling. But I can’t praise enough the players for what they’ve done tonight. And you know, quite a few of them could have been quite entitled and say: ‘Look, you know, you’re calling on me now and you want something from me now, but you haven’t been using me for that extent. So I’m not that keen to give you what you asking’. But that definitely wasn’t the case. And the same goes for the crowd. I think the crowd could quite justifiably say look, you know, you don’t give us any this year. But I can only hope that they saw tonight that we have helped put some sort of shape and structure into this team, there are players out there who have got the determination and guts to roll their sleeves up and get on with the job even in difficult circumstances. And you know, the new coach hopefully will find a lot of players that he can choose. He might well choose players in his first team that I didn’t because he’ll have a bit more time. I mean my problem, a little bit, was that we’ve been thrust into a situation where players were there. And we were told, or guided, if you like, to believe these are the ones and as a result, we believed in them. So they didn’t do that badly really, as such and it’s been therefore difficult for the ones behind to break in. But we’ve worked with everybody the same way so I wasn’t concerned tonight that the players would not understand the structure and the principles that we work on. I wasn’t concerned about that. I was just worried that they would be a little bit rusty having not played many matches, but they came through it well. So I would like to congratulate them and I’d like to congratulate the crowd as I’ve done on many occasions. This will be sounding as if I’m trying to get back for not having applauded them on the weekend. I don’t actually go around applauding crowds. But they have been good actually, I’ve got to say. Throughout you know they’ve been patient and I’ve never actually felt coming here, even in the bad times: We’re going to struggle today because the crowd will get on our backs, the crowd will make life hard for us. That’s never been the case. But they could have done if they wanted to because we haven’t given them what they wanted.
