In his own words: how Portsmouth boss galvanised a city and made title dream come true

When I came into the football club in January of last year, one of the first things I was really conscious of was building a connection between the players and the supporters.

It’s a bit of an intangible and sometimes you don’t know how to do it, sometimes the best way is to win football matches and win them playing a certain way.

But it’s something we were really aware of, with the playing style at Fratton Park being a big factor.

Sometimes when we’ve been a bit slow and deliberate in the build-up, it hasn’t suited us. It has suited us to have that high-tempo attacking football here, so that’s what we’ve tried to do.

We have to get the right mix between controlling games and doing that, but it's all helped to put us in a really good position.

Then, even when we’ve gone down in games, the fans have seen we’re trying to play a certain way. They’ve backed us and believe in us, they know we’re trying to be attacking.

Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn’t but for the majority of the season it has been that way. I think that that has helped to get that connection with the fans.

The away form has been really important as well, because we’ve got fans who travel up and down the country and spend a huge amount of money.

I remember going up to Barnsley last year on a Tuesday night, and we were rubbish, but we’ve worked hard on it and made a lot of progress. We’ve then seen the rewards and been able to do it consistently away and at home all season.

All of these things, along with a squad who’ve been sensible, for the most part, has been key. They’ve got their heads on their shoulders.

Then there’s the club captain. When you’ve got a club captain like Marlon Pack,  who knows what it means to be a Portsmouth fan and has that huge connection with the city, it makes my job really easy.

When you’ve seen the passion from the lads this season, it’s genuine. The love Marlon has for the club is genuine. That really helps.

In terms of our playing style, we are a side who try to build from the back and we try to play through midfield. But when sides have pressed us and pressed us well, we will try to play when the opportunity is there, but sometimes you have to bypass the press.

That’s particularly the case when you have physical centre-forwards like Colby Bishop, Kusini Yengi and Christian Saydee. Sometimes the best way to play is to go a bit more direct, land on second balls and go from there.

We try to attack in a number of different ways and have tried to evolve a bit through the season as well. I’ve been really pleased with our ability to do that.

The importance of set-pieces has just been absolutely massive throughout the year - and Barnsley exemplified that.

The fact that Conor Shaughnessy has popped up three times at home - Carlisle, Wycombe and Barnsley - with late winners in front of the Fratton End is testament to the work we put in with (coach) Joe Prodomo, and the fact the lads actually listen to him and attack the ball!

From my point of view, different head coaches do it different ways. We want to be practical with the way we play football - and we try to win games of football. There are plenty of ways to go about doing that.

We want to keep the identity, in terms of the way we want to play as a team, but we also want to be practical and just try to win games. Hopefully you’ve seen that this season.

But what has been absolutely crucial is, when you’re at a club like Portsmouth in this league, you have to try to use the advantage of the fanbase. Having played here as an opponent, and I remember saying this on day one, it’s not a nice place to come when Fratton is bouncing.

A couple of times in particular this season stand out, but obviously the Barnsley game in the last 15 minutes was just a joke.

It was so loud, even when we were 2-1 down the fans were still going. They were right on top of everything and it made it a difficult place to play for Barnsley. It does feel like you're sucking the ball into the back of the net.

This is a special place and I’ve spoken about Portsmouth being a unique island city. So, yes, we have tried to leverage that.

This is a massive football club and you’ve all played your roles in what we’ve achieved this season, so thank you. Now we have to use those special qualities and keep building on what we have going into next season.