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The rise and rise of Paulo Sousa: Swansea City's manager owes his life in football to the iceman...
By Ralph Ellis
Last updated at 1:44 AM on 27th November 2009
Comments (0) Add to My Stories Paulo Sousa is talking about the manager who had the biggest influence on his career, and his dark eyes glow bright with passion.
‘He was very important to me, he invested in me, in my position, in my playing, he gave me a lot of motivation,’ explains Swansea’s up-and-coming coach.
‘What he gave me most of all was to recognise in myself that I can do everything that I want to do. Everything.
‘How did he do it? By talking to me, sometimes for hours one on one, other times on the pitch to correct me. We spent time and when he spent time with players it had the effect to make them spend more time thinking about how to improve.’
I am a Swan: Sousa once starred for Juventus, but now he is entranced by the passion of the English game
So who was this inspiration? After all, Sousa, now building his own reputation as a manager, won the Champions League with different clubs in Italy and Germany, played more than 50 times for Portugal and worked for the likes of Carlos Queiroz and Marcello Lippi.
The answer might surprise you, for it was none other than the ice man himself, Sven Goran Eriksson, and here is a glimpse of how the Swede worked when he was building his career, far from the image we have now of him counting his money and letting his players do pretty much as they please.
They were together at Benfica when Sousa the young player was being remodelled by Eriksson the emerging manager. Nearly 20 years later the admiration is undimmed.
‘He saw something in me and he changed my position,’ says Sousa.
‘I normally played as a winger or as a No 9 or No 10 but then he put me in front of the defence as a pivot and it’s completely different. He changed me and he helped me to do it and to see how good I could become.’
Enlarge It’s clear that, after a false start at Queens Park Rangers, the 39-year-old with dreamy Latin good looks is bringing the same sort of passion for improvement to his own team.
Swansea go to leaders Newcastle tomorrow as the Championship’s surprise promotion contenders on the back of an 11-game unbeaten run. The club that launched Roberto Martinez on his way to the Premier League is fostering another foreign talent.
Sousa had been working for Portugal manager Queiroz before grabbing the chance to come to England at Loftus Road. There is still a tribunal hearing over his exit — sparked by the loan of a player without his approval — to come. Successful cases brought recently by Alan Curbishley and Kevin Keegan won’t have done his chances any harm.
‘I wanted to work and to stay in England. I believe it’s the best environment for a manager, for a player, for the fans.
‘There are full stadiums, a lot of passion and emotion, even in the second and third levels. The Championship is the fifth best league in the world. There are more people than some games with big clubs in Italy. Here you keep the stadiums full and the passion is unbelievable.’
Much travelled: Sousa in his Inter days
Sousa’s playing career was mercurial. Now he is burning with desire to do the same in management. ‘Perhaps after what happened at QPR it would have been easy to go home, but it made me even more determined.
‘As I see it, I work for the club but really I work for the players. If I can develop them, the team will develop, too. I invest time in them, just like Sven and also Lippi once invested in me. I’m lucky here that I’m given the chance to do it my way. This was the first thing we talked about when I came to the club. It’s very important.
‘When you have different ways, the players become confused, so it must be only one way, and the leadership has to from the manager and not other people.
‘I always had an obsession to learn. Maybe it’s because as a boy I was very shy. My father worked as a car mechanic, my mother sewing clothes, and they left home at six in the morning and didn’t get back until seven at night to make enough money for basic things.
‘I was on my own a lot and I just always looked at other people and tried to learn the good things. Sometimes you achieve a level and think it’s enough, but with me it is never enough because we can improve every time when we want.’
A win at Newcastle and Sousa might just keep improving all the way to the Premier League.
Read more:
www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1231251/The-rise-rise-Paulo-Sousa-Swansea-Citys-manager-owes-life-football-iceman-.html#ixzz0Y1TxtnLw
