Football News: Time For The Media To Forget Stoke's Pulis Era

Image from: ngrguardiannews.com

One thing that has bugged me recently is the media talking about how Mark Hughes has taken Stoke City too far away from their roots, that he has tried to change too much too soon. For one, how patronising is it that they believe football in Stoke did not exist prior to Tony Pulis, obviously because soccer was only invented with the arrival of the Premier League! Putting that aside though, the ridiculousness of the suggestion that any bad results are down to the club no longer playing the Pulis way is laughable.

It is like they are suggesting there is only one way of playing football in the world that will ever achieve success and that is to be big and strong and overpower the opposition. That will be why Spanish teams are dominating European football with bruisers like Lionel Messi to lunmp the ball long to. Mark Hughes has a different style of play he is bringing to the Potteries, which could well not work out but that will not be because he is changing it from the battling style that was the chosen way of playing for the previous man.

This does seem like hacks with an agenda, as Mark Hughes is considered arrogant by many, and has rubbed many people up the wrong way. To suggest it is that he is changing things too fast and going too far towards a ball playing style, it really is silly. Results are not as good as would be liked, but that is not because Stoke have suddenly become a weak side with no fight, it is just lazy journalism bringing those stories out.

Suggestions that the likes of Bojan Krkic make them weak fails to take into account that he is the only really small player that has been signed, with the likes of Xherdan Shaquiri being physically strong, along with technically skilled. The issues surrounding the Potters right now are injuries and new players fitting in and adjusting. I do wonder how long we will have to wait for the media to move on from Pulis, or whether I will spend the rest of my life hearing every defeat is a consequence of the club's attempt to move on from him?

Is this something that always happened in the media, or is this a consequence of the lazy hacks that prevail these days, that just take the easy way out to write a story? By now it is surely time to move past Pulis and his kick the opposition into submission way of playing, and realise that bad results, and good results for that matter, are down to Mark Hughes and the current squad. It is not about trying to change too fast, as that is not at all what is happening there.

The club is moving forward into the future, from a team scrapping to stay in the Premier League each year and avoid relegation, to a team scrapping to get into European competition on a regular basis. To do that, change is needed, to become a more technically accomplished side with players that can provide flair and trickery, as well as fight. Brawn will only carry the club so far, and it had reached that point and outgrown it.

Written by Tris Burke September 19 2015 16:39:06