Tony Pulis

“I don't like fiction, I like reading proper history.”

“I find rowing very boring, I've got to be honest.”

“Someone asked me 'What's the biggest thing you'll take out of the Premier League?' I said that you can't relax. I think you can go from having a great run of games - you can go four, five, six unbeaten - and turn a corner and go into a run of seven or eight games without winning. That's how difficult it is for the so-called smaller clubs.”

“In football if you don't spend the money well enough it comes back to bite you, over not one season but two or three!”

“What frustrates me more than anything is that I push on so far and people become complacent, lose that bit of edge, and it's very difficult to keep driving people on. That's probably the greatest fault of mine: I expect everybody to be like me.”

“That's what all the good players do. They actually go out and perform on the pitch.”

“I keep saying, and I've said it to the players, what happens in a dressing room stays in a dressing room, whether that's with me and a player, whether it's two players together, whether it's the coaching staff and the players. I just think it's almost a sacred environment and that trust in that area is unbreakable.”

“The Premier League is a wonderful league, the best league in the world, and there are a lot of clubs who overachieve and they overachieve massively. Because of results they get pushed down instead of people scratching the surface and seeing what is really happening.”

“There are loads of good principles we've lost as a nation. Discipline. Organisation. Respect. I was brought up with those.”

“I always remember sitting with my son, Anthony, at Arsenal one night and watching Barcelona during the warm-up. Messi launched this ball miles into the air and then killed it dead with his foot when it came back down. Anthony and I just looked at each other. Normal human beings aren't capable of doing that.”

“I have been animated all my life on the bench.”

“Ever since I started professional football at 15 there was always that togetherness and solidarity in the dressing room - it is a sanctuary. When I started football everyone believed it.”

“Stoke-on-Trent - forget about the football club, or the people at the football club, and the supporters - Stoke-on-Trent is a wonderful place.”

“Discipline and respect and hard work are not bad words. I expect that from everybody - especially the players who are in fortunate and very lucky positions.”

“We all get knocked down in life, the big thing is getting back up.”

“I've been happy at all the clubs I've been at.”

“I just get on with my job and do that job to the best of my ability.”

“I have this restlessness. I'm relentless to do things. My wife will say I'm an absolute nightmare.”

“I have read loads of books on Napoleon. For him to come from nothing and then lead his country, that fascinated me. It doesn't matter what you think of him. He did it.”

“We push experience aside and forget about people far too quickly.”