Mark Robins speaks on Stoke’s 26/27 preparations, facing a tougher Championship, changes, recruitment at the club, and much more.
A big show of support for Robins following a poor second half of the season, he is retained, and they have brought in highly rated under-21s head coach Max Porter to Mark Robins’ backroom staff after agreeing a deal with Arsenal.
A new era, new crest, with the aim of getting Stoke a top eight finish for next season, ‘on a mission to build a team that earns everything and reflects the passion of the club’s staff and supporters.’
Interviewer: Mark, we’re a week away from the players returning for the start of pre-season. What have the last couple of months looked like for them since the season finished at the start of May?
Mark: Well, the last game was played and generally after that they have down time. regardless of… or depending on if they’ve got commitments during the summer with the national teams, then, you know, they’ll go away for a period of time, but they always go with a plan. So they need a couple of weeks to reset. The ones that have been injured then have to continue until they are fit and clinically right, which is what they did. There was a change over obviously in the summer with Damian Roden coming in and the fact that we’d had that many injuries, we’re trying to mitigate against that happening again. So we’re looking in decent physical condition at the moment. Some of the players are training as we speak in a pre-season training camp, so they’ll come back ready to go on the 29th. Some of them obviously met up with the national teams and play national team football and then some have gone to the World Cup. Obviously, (Viktor Johansson) Vik’s not started the last game, but just to be there is a testament to the work that he’s done with the guys, with the fitness guys, with himself and the work that he’s had to put in to come back from his shoulder injury, think is fantastic that he’s there and I’m sure that he’ll be pushing to start great start for them five one win and Jun-ho looked like he was going to miss the World Cup then he was okay then he was on the bench didn’t make the pitch this this stage but It’s exciting for them, you know, and some of them have been involved in the pre-tournament games the ones that didn’t qualify for it, but it’s condensed, so because of that it’s condensed, the summer’s condensed. There’s eight weeks between the end of the season and the start of the pre-season and then a six week pre-season going into next season. So it comes around pretty quickly. So we’re almost there now, getting ready to go. And that’s what we’re doing at the moment, just putting all those preparations into overdrive now, ready to go for the pre-season coming up.
Interviewer: You mentioned Damian Roden earlier, he’s got a strong reputation in his field. How valuable will his experience be, do you feel, moving forward?
Mark: Well, I’ll be relying on him heavily. think, you know, with somebody, when you’ve got expertise like that around, you’d be stupid not to listen. So we’ve spoken at length and looking to maybe adjust one or two things. In terms of our loads and our outputs, we have to look at that. And clearly it was unsustainable in terms of what happened. A lot of those injuries were impact injuries to start with and then you end up getting the soft tissue injuries on the back of it because you’re using players that aren’t necessarily ready. So we’ve got to try and keep everybody ready and keep everybody in the picture to give ourselves the best chance. But clearly what happened last year in terms of results is totally unsustainable for everyone.
Interviewer: Damien isn’t the only recent arrival. Max Porter’s joined as one of your assistant managers. What do you make of the makeup of your coaching staff now?
Mark: When Nev (Paul Nevin) left there last January, we looked at a number of candidates and Max was highly regarded and thankfully, know, John Walters has managed to get what I think is a real coup because he’s got loads of energy, good ideas, good coach, modern coach. Somebody who’s done a lot of work with the 21s at Arsenal and has worked closely against uh their first team there in terms of setting up opposition so they can work out game plan or work out game plan and the tactical elements that come with it. And on the back of the season that they’ve had, he’s obviously done a really good job on that. To speak with him, he’s got some good ideas, really knowledgeable about the game. So he’s coming from a brilliant club, obviously Premier League champions just fell short in a couple of competitions, Champions League one being the latter one, but brilliant season nonetheless. And he comes in eager to add value to what we do here and, you know, speaking to him, like I say, I’m excited to work with him and hopefully have a really good flourishing period in his development, in his career. And obviously that’ll go a long way to helping us.
Interviewer: How will he kind of slot in amongst the group and how do you kind of operate as a manager? Are you someone that allows your coaches to kind of coach on the training pitch?
Mark: They’ve got to be able to paint the pictures. They’ve got to be able to go out and do their job. I will oversee that, but I’ll be joining in plenty on that. But I think with the way we work, with the way we’re going to work, that we’re going to attack the season is, or certainly the pre-season before the season starts, is exciting and it makes sense. And I think we’ve got to keep things very, very simple within the context of what we wanted to do and how we wanted to play. But we’re all on the same page. We know we’ve got to improve. We know we’ve not delivered last season for the supporters. And I think that something that’s really stuck with me is the fact that nothing is straightforward, know, it’s never a straight line. And if you can’t enjoy the journey, what’s the point? Somebody said that this summer, and if you can’t enjoy the journey, what is the point? You know, the journey is something that we talk about all the time and people think it’s rhetoric, it’s not, it’s that period in time, that we weren’t here when there was relegation happened from the Premier League and I understand everybody wants that immediately. That generally doesn’t happen, but when you get things right, you’ve got a real chance. You’re looking at top eight this season, so you have to be able to do it. Now the difference this year is that the league changes massively. You’ve got three teams coming down who are going to be strong from the Premier League. You’ve got teams coming up that are going also be strong, going to try and have go on the teams that were there last season are going to be stronger. It’s going to be a better season, it’s going to be a better Championship next season than it was last.
Interviewer: In terms of recruitment, what makes this place such an attractive proposition, do feel?
Mark: There’s a lot of things going for this club. It’s history, it’s tradition, it’s fans. The building we’re sat in, the gymnasium, the pitches, the new club crest, that’s a fantastic change. I think that, you know, that obviously is synonymous with the city. Yeah, it’s really welcome to be honest. I think it’s fantastic. The ownership, I’ve got to say that the ownership is brilliant and I feel a real sense of responsibility for him, for John Coates, for the amount of passion, the amount of money that he puts in every single season. And everybody within the building feels the same way, alongside its supporters because the supporters are key to everything that we do. So, again, know, the players, the prospective players that we might want to sign, this is an unbelievable opportunity for anybody. You know, we’ve got good coaches, we’ve got good staff, things are changing. The building, the working environment is as strong as anything outside the Premier League and would be up there with anything in the Premier League. I think we’ve got everything going for us when we’re recruiting. There is going to be a set of circumstances and a set of rules around things that are non-negotiable. So they’re going to have to graft. They’re going to have to work hard for our supporters, for me, for our owner, for John Walters, for everybody inside the building, because they’ve got to reflect the passion that exists in the building. And if you want to come for an easy ride, don’t come here. Don’t come here, because we need you to run. This is a season where we are going to ensure that everybody earns a salary and they earn everything, every penny that they get and enjoy doing it. And I think that that’s something that we’ve got to remember as well. It’s enjoyable. It has to be enjoyable. We want to succeed. So like I said before, things are changing and for the better.
Interviewer: In terms of recruitment, Stuart Harvey has joined as technical director, having been at a few clubs, including recently at Sunderland where he enjoyed success. How much can the club can it tap into his knowledge, going into this transfer window, do you feel?
Mark: Well, he’s pivotal and John obviously saw that that was something that he wanted to, needed to do and with his background and expertise, it’s somebody else who can help to deliver results by supporting John, by supporting the various departments that they do support anyway and run. I think with with recruitment, obviously real strong background in that and I think that that’s where he should be and will be employed to try and assist with that with those existing people, Ian Torrance and the department that he has. So, you know, I think that the players and the profiles that we’re looking for this season will inevitably mean that we have a stronger squad going into next season than we’ve had for a while. Yeah, the next bit is to go and prove that and deliver those players. But anybody that we go for will be somebody I feel, we feel as a collective that will make us a lot stronger and to deliver the results on more consistent basis.
Interviewer: Season card sales are set to exceed last season. What’s your reaction to hearing that news?
Mark: It’s incredible, absolutely incredible. We have to make sure that we repay that faith, but that faith is It’s gonna be worth it because this is this will turn around, you know, it will turn around but more than ever We need to be together. You’ve seen campaigns and the Coventry campaign where they were talking about rise together and from a position of real difficulty And they’ve ended up in the Premier League because they all stood together They all understood if we can do that and we can stick together even though it’s difficult at times and by the way it wasn’t easy for Coventry City either. We’ve got to make sure that we build and we put it in a better position, the club in the best position, the supporters to really enjoy watching the team and that’s one of our biggest motivators in every season but this one especially but also the fact that we’ve got an owner like John Coates he deserves the best, the supporters deserve the best and to support that and Jon Walters. We’ve got to support those people as best we possibly can do and make sure that this club becomes what it can be, which is a Premier League club, as quickly as we possibly can.
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