It will come as no surprise but this morning Tony Mowbray was asked a few questions about Alex Neil and his departure from us. Here is what he had to say on Alex Neil’s time here, his exit and how he’s getting on at Stoke.
AN RETURN
“Listen I’ve went back to Middlesbrough, I’ve been back to Blackburn you know, teams that I’ve spent a good few years at and I think for the individual for Alex I’m not sure whether he’s looking forward to it or there's some trepidation I’m not sure, he’ll just want his team to reflect how he wants them to be and for us we’ve got our one targets really, we’ve lost a couple of games last week and we need to get back to winning ways, so I’m pretty sure it will be a good football match, an intense football match.”
DETERMINED SIDE
“I think the opposition manager on the other side it’s irrelevant to what really goes on on the pitch and we have to find a way to come out on top if we can but they’ll be very determined to pick up points, they’re a very attritional team, they get the ball forward early.”
STOKE HISTORICALLY
“I think Stoke City historically from the Tony Pulis days have always been a difficult, hard working honest team and my minds still set of Stoke being like that, really difficult team to play against, get the ball forward, put it in your box, ask questions of you, run hard and from the bits I’ve watched of them they’re not too far from that, they’ve got good athleticism and I think it will be a difficult game for us, as every game is. Bristol City at home, look how well they are doing and yet they're not in the top six flying high but they’re a real hard working honest team as just about every team in this league is.”
AN DEPARTURE
“That's the fine balance really, for whatever reason he made the decision and he moved on and it’ll go down in the history books of the football club that he was the manager that got this club out of League One and in the Championship and hopefully back on an upward journey towards the Premier League at some stage in the future and that is not an easy job to get out of that league when you look at how tough it is this year in that league. I’m sure it was just as tough last year, some really big clubs in the division all sort of scrapping and fighting and with huge expectations and sometimes expectations can weigh you down and they managed to overcome that and get the job done.”
