Joey Barton admits a difficult first year in charge of Bristol Rovers has taken its toll, but he believes the club is getting "back to where we want to be".
The one-year anniversary of Barton's tenure BS7 will be marked on Tuesday, with struggle the theme of much of his 12 months in charge.
He was unable to steer the flawed squad he inherited to safety in League One last season, finishing bottom of the table, and Rovers made a sluggish start in the fourth tier with an overhauled squad taking several months to bed in.
Barton has previously admitted he had feelings of self-doubt in his lowest moments at Rovers, but he has been a noticeably rejuvenated figure in the past three months, preaching positivity.
Meanwhile, results have significantly improved to give the Gas a chance of bursting into the League Two play-off places, and Barton believes a changed culture off the pitch has also been instilled throughout the club.
With the Gas 11th in the table, seven points back from the top seven ahead of Saturday's trip to Stevenage, Barton is pleased with the direction the club is headed.
"We’ve all worked really hard as a group and as a football club," Barton said. "There have been some tough moments, many, many tough moments in a year that has certainly felt longer.
"You can see from the lines in my forehead that I’m resembling a shar pei these days, with grey hair. I had a lovely jet black mane and I looked about 30 years of age when I came in and I now look well in my 40s.
"That’s been a tough period, but as a football club we’ve stuck together. There have been some tough moments, but we’ve all stuck together and, thankfully, we’re out of the tailspin.
"The football club was drowning when I turned up and we went further down, but now we’re swimming back to safety and back to where we want to be.
"We’ve got so much hard work in front of us, but everybody is aligned and on the same page. You can see it in the crowds that are coming into the stadium. I think it was 6,700 on Tuesday night and 7,000 and 8,000 the week before.
"The level of positivity that’s in there is brilliant. I’m really, really pleased."
While results have been much improved since the turn of the year, Barton was not fully satisfied with collective performance levels on the pitch.
But on Tuesday night against Sutton United, he saw a team that was breaking new ground in its development – a view he says is shared by owner Wael Al-Qadi – in the 2-0 win at the Mem.
The manager said: "I spoke to the owner after the game and he said ‘That’s the best game of football since I’ve been here, I really enjoyed watching it’, and I did as a manager.
"That’s the first time I stood on the sideline and really enjoyed watching the team play.
"That’s a credit to the players and the fans because the atmosphere they create and the way they believe in the boys and get behind them has been key in getting the lads more confident and, certainly, turning around the home form. Long may that continue."
Barton, who has received strong backing from Al-Qadi throughout his tenure and has had influence over major changes in staff and structure at the club, believes the overhaul on and off the pitch is delivering progress for the Gas.
"This football club is coming," he said. "The days of the amateur approach are long gone and we're moving into a really professional space and hoping to drive an elite-level performing environment.
"If we stay on track with what we're doing, there is an upcycle from a tough spell.
"We're a long way from high performance, by the way, but that is what we're aiming at."
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