TRENDING: Steven Schumacher gives update on absence of Ryan Mmaee from first team squad

It was interesting to observe how Steven Schumacher handled the issue of Ryan Maee, and his absence from the team, during his news conference prior to Stoke’s trip to Blackburn.

Following the head coach’s scathing remarks about the importance of taking training properly, Mmaee was demoted to the bench at Sunderland and removed from the team entirely against Leicester. In his post-match interviews from the previous weekend, Schumacher had dropped a strong hint that something was wrong, but now was the time to clarify why. He took a direct stand without getting into the specifics of what went on behind closed doors.

“What I will say is that we’ve had an internal disciplinary issue with Ryan, a few things that have happened,” he said to Angela Smith in his broadcast press conference. “I won’t go into the details of that but it’s not doing what we expect and the behaviour we expect from one of our players. I spoke to him after the Sunderland game and said, ‘This is the situation and for the time being you won’t be available for selection.’

“That’s what happened and that’s still the case. He wasn’t in for the week leading up to the Leicester game, he has been in this week. He’s trained with the fitness coaches and he’ll continue training in the back end of the week with the under-21s. For now he isn’t available.”

That seemed like a significant occasion. Schumacher has made it plain what he considers to be non-negotiables; otherwise, well, they would just become negotiables.

He discussed his choice with Matt Sandoz for Radio Stoke and then again for the Sentinel, going into a little more detail about discipline.

That concludes our discussion. The onus is now on Mmaee. Because he was unable to reach the standards required in training, Stoke’s 26-year-old main striker is training with the under-21s ahead of a critical double header. Stoke is in desperate need of goals and points.

Stoke supporters are forgiving even if they have memory as thick as elephants. If there’s obvious humility, hard work, and most magically, goals, things can be quickly overlooked. What comes next will be intriguing to see.

Stoke fans’ reaction to Ryan Mmaee news

Martyn Boyd: Bang on Schuey don’t let any player think he is bigger than the club.

Richard Hunter: Good. Get rid if he doesn’t want to toe the line and put the effort in. This has been the problem for years. The only player who got away with bad time keeping etc was Fuller, and that’s because he still delivered on the pitch time and time again. It’s safe to say Mmaee is no Fuller!

Avtar Devgon: Players think that because they are popular with supporters, they can do what they want! Good to see a young manager getting support from the board to stamp his authority on discipline.

Paul Higgs: The people responsible for Mmaee’s signature should be held to account.

Alan Harding: Should have done the background homework on this player. Pulis always made this a must.

Steve Wallace: Can’t have bad attitudes at this stage.

What are Steven Schumacher’s non-negotiables?

As you may recall, Schumacher’s first few weeks in charge of Stoke were hectic, with matches against Millwall, Birmingham, Watford, and Ipswich scheduled essentially before he had time to catch his breath.

During that period, he outlined his expectations for both the training field and the games, including fundamentals like punctuality and deference, along with the four non-negotiables in the game: run forward and pass forward, recover it if you lose it, make all recovery runs sprints, and win your one-v-ones.

He said back on Boxing Day: “What we’ve tried to do with the lads is just set some pretty basic, simple ground rules about how we’re going to try to behave and at the training ground and what we expect, what are the non-negotiables and how we going to try to play, with and without the ball.”