Tidligere Pompey-kaptein Michael Doyle returnerer til Fratton Park.
NYHETER: Da Pompey vant League Two og rykket opp til League One i 2016/17, var Michael Doyle Pompeys kaptein. 41-åringen valgte ved sesongslutt overraskende å forlate Pompey da hans kontrakt gikk ut. Det var ventet at han ville få tilbud om en ny kontrakt, men Doyle ville ikke vente og signerte for Coventry City.
Her var Doyle i to sesonger og han var med også de lyseblå å rykke opp fra League Two til League One i sin første sesong her før han spilte en sesong for dem i League One før han gikk til Notts County. I Notts County var Doyle i tre sesonger, hvor han var spillende assistenttrener i sin siste sesong.
I fjor sommer ble han ansatt som assistenttrener for Ian Burchnall i Forest Green Rovers, men de fikk sparken i januar 23. Nå er Doyle altså tilbake på Fratton Park ansatt i akademiet som såkalt professional development phase coach.
SE OGSÅ: Michael Doyles profil
Michael Doyles kommentarer
«It’s brilliant to be back and I’m absolutely delighted to be working with a young and hungry bunch of players. I obviously worked with Rich [Hughes] at Forest Green and I was absolutely delighted when he reached out to me.
There’s been an opening since Zesh stepped up to work with the first team and so I want to be able to help the young lads here. But it’s also about helping myself to become a better coach after having some wonderful opportunities at Notts County at Forest Green. This is a different role in academy football and I remember some of the lads the club brought through when I was a player here. You had guys like Conor Chaplin, Jack Whatmough and Ben Close, who have gone on to have good careers.
If we can help to push a few of the lads here through into senior football, it will be brilliant for everybody – especially for the fans, who love to see homegrown players. This is an excellent training environment and so the boys are very lucky, but they also work hard and we’ve got to get them ready to make that step up. I’m looking forward to helping them develop.”
Michael Doyle i aksjon som spiller for Pompey.
Akademimanager Greg Millers kommentarer
«We liked what Zesh offered us last season – partly because of the skill set he has as a coach, but also the experience he provided from playing at different levels of the game. He had also been only recently retired, so there was a great relevance there when he was coaching youngsters and they could relate to him.
So when we got the good news that he was moving to a role in the first team, we liked the thought of having that playing background, as well as having qualifications to coach in our under-18 framework. We went through the recruitment process and interviewed a number of candidates, and were delighted when Michael showed an interest.
We felt he was a strong candidate and when we did the practical coaching part of the interview, he was getting across the right information to players that had come from the experience he had gained. He’s played for this club before during a successful period and Michael told us that he had a strong affinity for Pompey.
When you’re asking someone to relocate, there’s always a nervousness about whether this will be the right environment, but we know he loves living in this area and will be committed to the role. He wants to keep learning and developing, which there isn’t a lot of time for when you go straight into a first team environment.
Michael has got that experience of going from match to match to match, but we can afford full training weeks to work with the players to equip them fully for the games programme.”