After leading Stoke City to safety yet again this season, Tony Pulis has quit his role as manager of Stoke City Football Club.
After serving the club for seven years in his second stint at the club which included an FA Cup final appearance as well as a spell in the Europa League, the Welshman has decided to step down and part ways with the club after apparently discussing the matter in an end-of-season debrief on Tuesday.
This season marks the sixth consecutive season that Pulis’ Stoke side have maintained a Premier League status but it’s the manner with which that they secured said status this time around that is believed to be behind Pulis’ departure.
Having went on a run of winning only one of 14 games before securing back to back wins against QPR and Norwich proved to be enough to guarantee Stoke’s safety this season but this latest escape from relegation seems to have proved too close for comfort for the Stoke board especially after the considerable investment that the board have made in the team for a club of their size.
A lack of goals this season has been Stoke’s problem as whilst their physicality and long-ball approach has still caused problems for teams, those problems have been eased by Stoke’s paltry goal total of just 34 goals in 38 Premier League games, the second lowest total in the whole of the league.
Potential avenues for replacing Pulis are yet to come to light but one must wonder whether or not this’ll be the end of the more physical Stoke side we’re used to seeing as a new manager might want to impose a different stamp on the team i.e a more possession based approach which would be a shame because watching this Stoke side with all their physicality and guile has been an intriguing cog in the Premier League machine for the past number of years.