STOKE CITY players are bemused after Scrooge boss Mark Hughes called them in for Christmas Day training – despite NOT having a game on Boxing Day.
Most teams traditionally play on the 26th and therefore calling into the train on the big day is not unusual, the Potters‘ trip to Liverpool was switched to the following evening.
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But Ebeneezer Hughes still wants his players in for Christmas Day training – and even sniggered at his overseas stars as they’re used to having their feet up on Christmas Day – and for a week or two before and after the big day thanks to their winter breaks.
He said: “We are in. We will be in Christmas Day because game day minus two we are always in.
“I know a few of the foreign lads scratch their head and wonder `what have we done coming to this mad house?’
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“But I love it. I used to love it as a player.”
He loves it as a manager, too, by the sound of it – but in Hughes’s defence, there is a serious work going on during thanks to those back-to-back trips to Liverpool on December 27 and then Chelsea four days later on New Year’s Eve.
Assessing Chelsea’s spurt to the top, he said: “They look very strong. They have fallen into a formation that’s working for them.
“When you’ve got outstanding players working hard, you’ve always got a chance to win Premier League games.”
Hughes will want keep up their decent form after a poor start to the season, starting at home to struggling Champions Leicester City today - despite being without the suspended Marko Arnautovic.
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