Jan Poortvliet hits out at Wotte "I felt screwed by Wotte"

The following is a transcripted part of a larger interview from Voetbal International (Dutch footie magazine) with Jan Poortvliet. Part of the article is about his time at St. Mary's. He blasts the role Mark Wotte played during his tenure with Southampton and expresses his views of his unsuccessful spell.

...
How do you look back at your adventure in England?
JP: It was a horrible spell. At the start it sounded wonderful. I had always dreamed of coaching in England. But as of day one I arrived in a tricky situation. It started with that arbitration against Helmond Sport, where I was working at the time. I"m very sad that things went that way. I have always enjoyed working there and had hoped they'd allow me to take on this opportunity to go to England, but unfortunately they did not. Nevertheless I decided to continue my case since Southampton really wanted me. I had expected them to support me in this case regardless of the outcome of the arbitration. In the end Helmond Sport were allowed a fee 75.000 euro. When I signed my contract in Southamption later it turned out, in a small addendum, that I had to pay this on my own. It's not a sum of money I have waiting on the shelves so it put me into a difficult situation. Also the contract didn't look like I expected. It was a roll-over contract, with an option for another year, after each season. While we had agreed on a three-year deal earlier.

Then why did you sign?
JP: It was an unexpected blow. I was there all alone in England. I didn't have a manager or agent with me. I didn't know better so I put my signature there.

What else went wrong after that?
JP: I soon discovered Southmapton is a snakepit. It's a club with a lot of different movements inside. The past few years there have been a lot of people in control and they still have influence in the current organisation. The chairman at the time, Rupert Lowe, was hated by everyone within the organisation. He got me on board, but was almost instantly pressured to get rid of me. Lowe became nervous. He started to interfere with everything. Then he started to moan about our keeper Kelvin Davies couldn't handle the ball well enough. I then told him that this lad has been between the pipes for twenty years here, I’m not going to teach him to give an inch perfect pass across the field from one day to the other. We got into all kind of such useless discussions. Also sort of games were begin played. In the end I was there on my own. An assistant coach and goalkeeper coach were fired, both without any reason. It was one big madhouse. Nobody at Southampton has ever seemed to know the word cooperation, everybody wanted to sit on the throne himself. It drives you crazy.

You would partner up with Mark Wotte who was presented at the same time as you as Chief Academy. What role did he play in all this?
JP: He never did anything to support me. He was only after one thing: my job.

Story is he already criticized you within the board after just the first exhibition game
JP: That’s what I heard too. And so I also found out stories that he constantly was trying to get my job. Officially he was assigned as head of the Academy., but he was never at youth games on Saturday. Then he was always watching the first team from the director’s box. Both home and away. That’s typically of the person Wotte. Already when you notice his presence it’s clear. Wearing a nice suit, chest and chin up. He felt he was higher ranked than me and felt he had was entitled the job of head coach more than I was. And he succeeded in that as well! After my dismissal he immediately took over. His mission was accomplished, well done!

The combination Poortvliet-Wotte seemed impossible from the start.
JP: Well, it was a mistake to put us together. We’re totally different persons, but I really did my best to make something from it. I wanted to involve him in everything and had no problem in working on an equal basis. But that wasn’t enough for Wotte. He had his own agenda. After some time our cooperation was that bad that somebody had to go. Him or me. I then also tried to get him out, I’m honest about that. But the club didn’t want to let him go and later I got fired myself. Initially that gave me a hard time but soon I felt enormously relieved. For half a year I had lived with immense stress. I was glad to be home again.

Southampton’s results were disappointing under your command. When you were fired, the team were second last in the Championship.
JP: The squad was extremely young, almost all players were between seventeen and early twenty. Physically we didn’t produce enough and we also lacked experience and offense. But I did for what I was appointed. The talents developed nicely and at times we played mouthwatering football. In the end I was judged on the lack of results, that’s legit. Wotte thought he’d do better. In the end he got relegated with Southampton. Very sorry for the club, but I was glad they went down. I felt screwed by Wotte, that he relegated gave me peace. Under his command the team started to play kick-and-rush again. He replaced the promising youngsters by veteran players. The transfer value of the players that had carefully gone up during the season were now minimized again. He demolished all my work and I find that quite painful.

Has your spell in England be a success financially?
JP: Stop it, I only had a minimal wage and also had to pay my former team Helmond Sport. In the end all this cost me money rather than earning me. It has been one huge disaster.

Mark Wotte was asked to respond on this article.
“I have always supported Jan Poortvliet at Southampton. I’m surprised he now reacts in this fashion. He probably left frustrated but then he shouldn’t pass it over to me. If he had a problem with me, he should have told me in my face. It’s nonsense that I was after his job since I enjoyed my position outside the spotlights. Other than that it’s not that great to take charge of a team that is in 23rd position. Poortvliet knew why I was in the director’s box during games. This was on request of the chairman who wanted to talk football with me during the games. At times I even defended Poortvliet during those meetings. After his departure I took care of the financial settlement with him. It’s sad that he is now expressing these things about me.”

_J-

Interesting post. thank you.If Wotte was after his job then he got his come uppance!.I just feel much happier with the way things are now

AS do we all. Excellent post for a first Joey. Be hard to keep that up.

"JP: I soon discovered Southmapton is a snakepit. It's a club with a lot of different movements inside. The past few years there have been a lot of people in control and they still have influence in the current organisation"

Even now??

Thank Santa it has all changed!

What a great post! Fantastic to get an insight, even if it comes from a bitter man. Mind you, I can understand that if the situation is how he described it.

Anyway, a good read.

Great read and i am inclined to believe a lot of what he said.

All in the past, we have moved on

Thankyou to Jan for his efforts, shame that he was in such a hard position to succeed in.

Glad to hear you liked the story. I thought it might be interesting to Soton fans.

As for my view on the matter. Like always a story has got two sides, same in this case I believe. Fact is that Poortvliet and Wotte are not a good combination due to their different personalities. The management who appointed them can be blamed for that.
Personally I have no trust in Wotte whatsoever. He's 'worked himself up' several times before and seems to like the velvet seat. Then again, I don't think he was after getting rid of Poortvliet in this matter.
Poortvliet himself is not capable of running a team like Southampton. He's too 'nice' to get into political games and to stick up for himself. He can do a decent job working with a young talented team but off the pitch he's far from experienced. It'd have made more sense if he'd been leading/training the academy and Wotte taking on the first team job (although you'd need to look hard to find a success on his resume as a coach).
Furthermore Poortvliet is whining too much in this article instead of pointing the finger to himself. He's a grown up man now, so for example is self responsible for what he signs. Complaining afterwards makes very few sense in my opinion. Also it seems everyone was to blame except him. While I tend to agree that Southampton was a snakepit last season with a lot going on off the pitch, it can't be true that Poortvliet did perform nothing other that outstanding. From what I've seen and heard last season there was quite some criticism on his team selection and style of play.
Finally, as for Wotte playing the blame game when being replaced this summer after taking care of the team late in the season: I can't feel any sympathy for him. He has sat on the position of other fired managers in the past as well and he's shrewed enough to know he should survive in this world himself first..and other later. To complain that he could've accepted a lucrative contract somewhere in the middle East is a common thing to do to get some sympathy votes, but also he, like Poortvliet, is responsible for his own actions. He decided to stay and would probably have received a nice sum of money on his way back to the Netherlands.

Back to the facts:
Poortvliet is now coaching FC Eindhoven. Basically a Dutch equivalent of Southampton (no money, and each year threatened to not receiving a license to stay in the league). Fortunately for him it’s not a political snakepit there (and barely any fans watching) and the atmosphere is amateur ‘loose’ like. So that should blossom him up and he’d do a decent job there. He won his first game 4-3 after a 0-3 deficit.
In the article he claimed to have other options:
“I had a few options in England this summer. I was a candidate at Reading for a coaching staff position and only a few weeks ago I was contacted by Stoke City. I know manager Tony Pulis quite well because his son played for me at Southampton. He wanted to contract me as a field trainer. But I rejected the offer because I had already given my word to FC Eindhoven.”

Wise decision I feel, after he already “screwed” his former team Helmond Sport leaving them team whilst still holding a 2 year contract with them and deciding not to show up for training anymore. If interested I can dig up a short interview with the Helmond Sport technical director on that issue as well.

_j-

Thanks for the great input Joey. Are you a Saints fan? Do you live here or Holland??

I tend to agree with some of your comments Joey. He has been whining about the job after leaving, but there was a time when he had a major row with the then chairman . I think it was just a couple of weeks before he left and it was in front of the players. Woyye was instantly disliked by the fans because of his stupid statements when he took over the reins from JP. JP always came across as a decent man who had bitten off more than he could chew.

Glad to see both Dutchmen out of SMS to be honest. I did feel sorry that Wotte was unceremoniously dumped but that's football, and the club's bigger and more important that one man and I now feel that getting rid and getting AP in is the best thing that could have happened.
Poortvliet was a decent bloke, by the sounds of things, but well out of his depth and the damage was long done before he jumped/was pushed and Wotte stepped into the managerial role.

Actually thank heavens (or Markus Liebherr!) the whole bloody lot of them are gone from SMS now, the dodgy Dutch duo, the snakepit and the duck-hunting red-faced vermin himself. While it was a dodgy period and very uncomfortable for all of us, admin, in hindsight, was the best thing that could have happened.

The really stupid thing is,Rupert could have found a buyer if he hadn't been such a *******(choose your own word)

What goes around come around.

Bob's your Uncle wrote:Thanks for the great input Joey. Are you a Saints fan? Do you live here or Holland??

Í do indeed live in Holland but am not a Saints fan, sorry. I'm a big time Evertonian but have always felt sympathy for Southampton from the days of T.Fowler, M.LeTissier, G.LeSaux, J.Dodd, etc.

_j-

SFC Forever wrote:The really stupid thing is,Rupert could have found a buyer if he hadn't been such a *******(choose your own word)

The word I can think of to describe that man I can't use on here! Suffice to say, it's short, begins with 'c' and is probably the most offensive word in the English language! :twisted:

Conman,Creep,Cheat,Conceited in any order says dad. He also used the other word and a few more over the last year.