Ian Holloway explained how he has tried to turn Swindon Town around after he was nominated for League Two Manager of the Month.
Swindon have been on a great run since the start of the new year as Holloway has managed to turn relegation fears into the hope of a strong end to the campaign.
Having improved through the festive period, Town lost just one match in January as they moved from three points above the relegation zone to being closer to the playoff places than the bottom two by the end of the month.
Those efforts saw him nominated for Manager of the Month for January alongside Graham Alexander, Johnnie Jackson, and Grant McCann and he spoke to Jeff Stelling and Ally McCoist on TalkSport about how he had gone about trying to make a difference at Swindon.
He said: “I have just talked to people, really, tried to connect to the people at the club and make them feel good, even if it is going wrong you have to enjoy what you are doing.
“We have to be honest about where we are and I made a couple of changes with some different skill sets.
“As far as I am concerned there was a lack of lustre about the place and hopefully now we are enjoying what we do and having a bit of a laugh about it if we don’t do so well as you shouldn’t take yourself too seriously.”
Holloway added that when he arrived he was disappointed with how the players were as a group and told a story about Pharrell Johnson to demonstrate the problems he inherited which really concerned him.
He said: “What surprised me was where they were when I saw the skill of the lads and also how they weren’t a group.
“Going in and making people accept responsibility, not just for themselves or what they have just done in a team situation but how to help someone else around them and not being selfish.
“It was blatantly apparent, we have got a player called Pharrell Johnson and he was injured with a stress fracture and the poor lad was running about and he had an injury and then it flared up again and he had to have six screws put in his leg.
“Not one of my team rung him and asked him how it went, not one, not the captain or anybody.
“I rang him and he was shocked when I asked ‘Have the lads helped you?’
"So, I hammered them, ‘That is a disgraceful attitude, why aren’t you caring about him?’
“To be honest, I think that was the turning point if you asked the lads when I made them embarrassed about that because you can’t do anything on your own.
“Every other manager I have spoken to says the same thing that players don’t talk any more, every player above me made me who I am and that is what I am asking my senior ones to do.”
