davieG Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 From the Merc Leicester City boss Paulo Sousa can 'change the face of football' One of Paulo Sousa's backroom team at QPR believes Leicester City can be at the forefront of a sea-change in playing styles in the English leagues. Gareth Ainsworth says England's poor performance in the World Cup highlighted technical deficiencies which Sousa will try to address at the Walkers Stadium. Former QPR player-coach Ainsworth worked closely with Sousa when the Portuguese international arrived at Loftus Road in October 2008. Sousa lasted barely six months, but Ainsworth believes City have made a winning appointment in the man who last season guided Swansea to within a point of the play-offs. "He is an advocate of football and, although he is Portuguese, in a way he will be pleased that Spain won the World Cup because it was a victory for football," said Ainsworth. "And this is where things have to change with the English game. Being fit and strong in the Championship is now a given, but players need more. "They need to retain the ball and be comfortable on it and I'm sure the Leicester lads will be happy that they are not constantly doing laps of the pitch. "This is what Paulo will be instilling in them, but it will take time. It is also the way forward for the country." Ainsworth, a vastly experienced player who also had spells with Wimbledon and Preston, believes that Sousa, who twice won the Champions League as a player, would have had an impact at the Belvoir Drive training ground from day one. "Paulo is not what they would have been used to, this guy oozes charisma," said Ainsworth. "He is intelligent and will have a lot of respect from the players who looked at his CV, but he would also be the first to say this is not what will make him a good manager. "With respect to Swansea, Leicester are a bigger club and he has a chairman who wants to be successful. "The players will learn so much from him as he is different from the majority of managers. He is so tactically aware." But Ainsworth said it would be wrong of him to give too great an insight into Sousa's coaching methods. Ainsworth, who at 38 is still playing with Wycombe in League Two, said: "I can't tell you too much about his style because Paulo always likes to keep things close to his chest. "It would be unfair of me to reveal his secrets, but what I can say is that his techniques added to people's games. "When you work with a legend like that, you can't help but be inspired. "He has got great contacts around the world but there's no point bringing in foreign talents if you can't communicate with them. I've seen it before and it's a big problem. "Paulo will go around and happily speak in Spanish one minute, English the next and then French. "It means he can get across exactly what he wants to say and everyone benefits from it."
andy_croydz Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 To be fair I think that is one major benefit we have with Sousa as manager... The fact he is quite popular in the Footballing world and he can speak a fair few languages. With Allen, Holloway, Pearson etc... They probably didn't have such an extended knowledge of foreign countries as Sousa has. I can see us signing a few more Portuguese players in the near future.
maddog Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 So Gareth Ainsworth thinks we are going to be PL champions very soon then playing a new brand of football, better than Barca. Fantastic.
Lillehamring Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 all well and good, but i guess i'm the only one who hates spanish football - 80 minutes of trying to win freekicks by any means necessary and 10 minutes of great football - if that's the way football is going i'm going to start watching baseball.
Libertine Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 all well and good, but i guess i'm the only one who hates spanish football - 80 minutes of trying to win freekicks by any means necessary and 10 minutes of great football - if that's the way football is going i'm going to start watching baseball.
davieG Posted 27 July 2010 Author Posted 27 July 2010 all well and good, but i guess i'm the only one who hates spanish football - 80 minutes of trying to win freekicks by any means necessary and 10 minutes of great football - if that's the way football is going i'm going to start watching baseball. I doubt we'll ever get totally Spanish because of our weather and culture but I would welcome watching a team that actually tries to retain the ball with quality passing, it makes me weep when I see our players attempting to make 10 yard passes to an unmarked player and failing. I'm sick to death of seeing our goalkeepers hoofing the ball up field and finding the opposition. There is a middle ground and were still far far from that so I wouldn't worry about us being mistaken for a Spanish side.
dandannieldanok Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 all well and good, but i guess i'm the only one who hates spanish football - 80 minutes of trying to win freekicks by any means necessary and 10 minutes of great football - if that's the way football is going i'm going to start watching baseball. It's not going to be like that because our players are not inclined to dive and cheat (from what I've personally seen of them), unlike a lot of continental players. Possession football doesn't automatically mean the players are going to turn into cheating arseholes.
Jordan Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 I think the Merc needs to start taking it easy on the whole massively-inflate-expectations-for-Sousa thing a bit.
OzFox Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 I doubt we'll ever get totally Spanish because of our weather and culture but I would welcome watching a team that actually tries to retain the ball with quality passing, it makes me weep when I see our players attempting to make 10 yard passes to an unmarked player and failing. I'm sick to death of seeing our goalkeepers hoofing the ball up field and finding the opposition. There is a middle ground and were still far far from that so I wouldn't worry about us being mistaken for a Spanish side. It makes me weep when so called "professional" footballers can only kick with one foot. What do they do all day in training? When I was a kid I was naturally right footed, so I practiced and practiced until I could control, pass and shoot with my left as well as my right. It's not that hard, and yet few pros seem bothered to learn. Hopefully Paulo sorts that out, coz I'm sick to death of watching the glorifed athletes that made up some of our recent sides
davieG Posted 27 July 2010 Author Posted 27 July 2010 It makes me weep when so called "professional" footballers can only kick with one foot. What do they do all day in training? When I was a kid I was naturally right footed, so I practiced and practiced until I could control, pass and shoot with my left as well as my right. It's not that hard, and yet few pros seem bothered to learn. Hopefully Paulo sorts that out, coz I'm sick to death of watching the glorifed athletes that made up some of our recent sides I think you're on a loser there when you've got top players in the PL trying to shoot with the outside of their right foot when it would be so much easier with their left if only they could and if you can get paid £100/week plus for being one footed why should they bother
OzFox Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 I think you're on a loser there when you've got top players in the PL trying to shoot with the outside of their right foot when it would be so much easier with their left if only they could and if you can get paid £100/week plus for being one footed why should they bother Coz if they were two footed wonders, they'd probably be on 200 grand a week! Fryatt and Howard are both pretty decent on their "wrong" foot. Apart from that the only player I can think of recently who could actually shoot from distance with both feet is Gareth Williams
DJ Barry Hammond Posted 27 July 2010 Posted 27 July 2010 Is Gareth out of work, or is this genuine praise?
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