Samuel/Hughes

Fascinating stuff from today's Daily Mail - a big interview with Mark Hughes, done by Martin Samuel.

I don't really want to commend various bit at the expense of others - it's all worth reading - but the very best bits are on training and transfers.

‘It frustrates me, this perception that there are only a handful of guys in the world who can take a training session.

'It feels like I’m attempting a hard sell here, but I’ll wager Manchester City has the best qualified coaching staff in the country. And a badge isn’t everything, but I have watched some of the greatest coaches and, believe me, they are doing little that is different...I know the players at Manchester City get the same treatment they would get at the biggest clubs in Europe. That is my way.

‘Any player taking a step up to join Manchester City will notice the difference, and any player who has come from an elite club will not see the join. Roque Santa Cruz came to Blackburn Rovers from Bayern Munich, which was the most professional club I ever played for, and he had no problem with how we worked on a daily basis.

And then regarding transfers, particularly a certain Brazilian.

‘So we tried to buy Kaka?’ he asks. ‘I couldn’t see a downside, because I didn’t realise how badly we were going to get hammered if we failed to bring it off.

'Yet what were we meant to do? When the opportunity to bring in one of the top players in the world comes along, you cannot fail to pursue it out of fear that it has come too soon. It might not happen again and you will always be wondering, what if? So, no, it would not put me off trying again.

‘We were right to do it and we got closer than people expected. Yes, we were running before we could walk, but we were trying to make something happen here.

I really enjoyed reading this. Hughes is so cagey in his television interviews that he's barely worth watching. But there's quite a lot that's interesting in this.