Paolo Sousa has made a fine start his managerial career at Swansea, with the Welsh outfit travelling to leaders Newcastle this weekend currently sitting in fourth place in the table on the back of an 11-game unbeaten run.
As a player, Sousa wore the colours of the likes of Benfica, Sporting Lisbon, Borussia Dortmund, Juventus and Inter Milan, not to mention winning 51 caps for Portugal.
Understandably, the 39-year-old played under a long list of big-name coaches – but he says the manager who had the biggest influence on his career was none other than Sven-Goran Eriksson at Benfica.
“He was very important to me, he invested in me, he gave me a lot of motivation,” said Sousa. “How did he do it? By talking to me, sometimes for hours one on one, other times on the pitch to correct me.
“We spent time together and when he spent time with players it had the effect to make them spend more time thinking about how to improve.
“I normally played as a winger or a no.9 or no.10 but then he put me in front of the defence as a pivot and it’s completely different. He changed me and he helped me do it and to see how good I could become.”
