Mark Hughes ignoring 'noise' on his Southampton future
Thursday 22 November 2018 16:22, UK
Mark Hughes has called for time to turn Southampton around amid the "noise" over his future.
Southampton face Fulham at Craven Cottage on Saturday looking for their first win in the Premier League since the beginning of September.
The Saints are above the bottom three only on goal difference but Hughes has shrugged off reports that he could be sacked if Southampton lose, and said he is building for the long term.
"I've got to look ahead to the next game but for me it's about a longer-term view of trying to move this group of players and this club forward," he said.
"That's not going to happen overnight, we had problems last year and were able to get ourselves out of the situation we found ourselves in.
"Some of the problems that were there last year are still there and we're still addressing them but we're getting better at the things we're trying to do.
"There will always be speculation, I call it noise. There is always some noise when one manager departs and that noise then switches to someone else.
"Maybe at the moment a little bit of the noise is around me, it's the nature of the role I have but the only way it goes away is by getting positive results and positive performances.
"For the most part our performances have been at a decent level and that encourages me because I think that if we continue in that vein, then we are going to win more than we lose.
"Are we doing as bad as people are saying? I don't think so because in almost every game we've played we've been competitive."
Hughes will be in the opposite dugout to Claudio Ranieri, who is taking charge of Fulham for the first time following Slavisa Jokanovic's dismissal last week.
The Southampton boss is unsure whether his team will benefit from the change of personnel at Craven Cottage.
"It's difficult to say, it could be a positive for the team that makes a change, sometimes it can be a negative," he added.
"It could be they needed a change of focus, a little bit of a change of direction. I don't the circumstances of it, obviously it's results driven as we all know but clearly they've got a group of players that they feel are underperforming.
"That could be said of the group I have but I think when you do make a change the positive may be that people get back on board for a couple of games. But that can very quickly disappear if you don't start getting results."
