Hourihan excited by vision for Argyle Women
Argyle Women announced Marie Hourihan as their new head coach at Home Park on Thursday, ahead of the 2025/26 campaign, marking a new era for the Greens.
After securing safety in the FAWNL Southern Premier Division on the final day against Gwalia United, the extensive search for a new boss ended with Hourihan taking the helm in Devon.
The former Stoke City head coach departed the Potters after two seasons, and arrives in Plymouth after a successful season with the fellow tier-three side, which saw them reach the final of the FAWNL Cup and finish third in the Northern Premier Division.
Hourihan got a taste of the Green Army and Home Park last season, when the Greens faced Stoke in the semi-finals of the cup, and she admitted that day helped as a key factor in making the move.
“Coming to the stadium, the enormity of Home Park hits you straight away,” Hourihan told Argyle TV in her first interview with the club. “What a facility. Doing our due diligence on the team as well, there’s a nucleus of players to say that there’s something here. Also, just meeting the people as well. We were the away team but how well we were treated, and everyone couldn't help us enough.
“Those were the standout things for me. When this opportunity came about, immediately all of those feelings and emotions of being down here and in that environment were just reinforced even more. When I met the guys down here, it made the decision quite easy for me.
“The biggest thing was the alignment from the owner, to the board and staff on the ground, of a clear vision for the Women's team. There's a real hunger and desire for the team to be at the centre point of the football club. When you come down and see Home Park, as well as the new training facilities, everything is here, and the want is here.
“It’s an opportunity that I feel is a football club that has got the potential to go wherever it wants to go and the desire to go wherever it wants to go, which is important for me. As I said, when I drove out of here, I was like: ‘this is an opportunity that I can't turn down.’”
Hourihan had a playing career marked by high-level honours in England. A multiple-time winner of the WSL and FA Cup with Manchester City, Chelsea and Birmingham City, the goalkeeper got to experience several clubs, managers and opportunities to help further her career.
One of those was Emma Hayes OBE. The current United States Women’s National Team head coach oversaw Chelsea for over a decade, and within that spell topped the WSL with Hourihan as part of the squad.
Speaking about her time for the Blues, the 36-year-old had nothing but positive thoughts and appreciation for the work Hayes did, and the influence taken from her trailblazing leadership.
Hourihan said: “I was at Chelsea during the early part of Emma Hayes' tenure there. That was a brilliant experience because I always credit her for the turnaround at that football club. At the start, they were training two nights a week, 8pm until 10pm, and now you see Chelsea as a mammoth of a football club.
“To be a part of that transition, where she professionalised the club and the women's team, to have seen that and been part of that first-hand, is something that I'm trying to use my experiences of.
“Those opportunities that I've had to work with people like that and take a lot from, I've now tried to apply some of those little snippets into how I coach and manage players, but obviously with a little bit of my personality mixed into that. I've been very fortunate to work with some top people and coaches off the back of that.
“What resonated with me was leaving a club in a better place than you found it; that's something definitely that she did. However, it's also about taking people with you. It’s a journey, about elevating people that you're working alongside, and bringing them with you on that journey, which is the beauty of the women's game.
“At the level we’re operating at, you're giving people those opportunities and you can grow something. It’s taking those experiences and now trying to apply it. I've had some very good mentors and opportunities to learn from really good people.”
Hourihan’s experiences and opportunities have paved the way for an exciting managerial approach, and she hopes to quickly implement her style of play at Home Park with pre-season and an important few months quickly approaching.
“I like to bring the best out of players,” she explained. “I want to give them the confidence to go and express themselves on the pitch, playing in a clear structure that's going to get the best version of them.
“I do drive standards quite a lot. That is something if you ask the players that I work with they'd say, ‘in training, she'll let you know if the standards aren't at the right level’. For me, it's more about elevating the players and making them better rather than me being at the forefront.
“As a team, I like to dominate the ball. I want the players to feel they have the freedom to take risks, so they must trust the environment and me within that. Building those relationships and that trust is really important.
“The biggest thing for me is embedding myself in this football club and bringing our brand or style of football to Home Park, and getting the players comfortable playing within that. That's probably my main port of call right now and I know that might take a little bit of time.
“It’s going to be very different, potentially, for some of the players, so in the short term, it's about getting the players familiar and comfortable with that, and then building a sustainable tier-three team.
“There’s the ambition and the appetite, in the club’s vision, to want to have a women's team that are striving to be a professional women's team, which is the long-term plan, but right now I think the most important thing is that we get the team performing and thriving on the pitch.”
