Mark Hughes has praised his counterpart at Southampton, Ronald Koeman, by saying that he has done a stellar job in his short time at the club. Koeman was appointed as the successor for Pochettino, who decided to join Tottenham in the summer. The summer transfer window was followed by a lot of talk around the club being unable to even fighter relegation battle. Such was the astronomical sale of the important first-team players to the likes of Manchester United and Liverpool. More than £ 100 million was raised due to the departure of names like Luke Shaw and Adam Lallana.
Koeman, though, made Southampton become involved in the transfer window in terms of purchases during the end of the window. The new arrivals coupled with a success of loan stars have made Southampton a force in the Premier League this season. Going into the weekend’s match against Stoke City, Southampton are in the position where they could potentially go second in the table. Hughes says that this is a major achievement from a manager with limited resources at his disposal. Once upon a time, the former Chelsea striker was also famed for overachieving on a limited budget at Blackburn Rovers.
“When it happens in such a short space of time it’s difficult because they lost their manager and they lost two or three key players who had been exceptional for them the year previously. There was perhaps a fear if they didn’t get the right players in, and the right manager, then there could be a difficulty. But in fairness they have not had the issue of being unable to go into the market and spend good money. They’ve had a decent amount of money to work with that has enabled them to get good quality into the building,” said Hughes.