What Ralph Hasenhuttl told James Ward-Prowse that changed his Southampton career | OneFootball

James Ward-Prowse returned to St Mary's in August after four years away, and one piece of advice from a former manager helped him grow as a player.

A challenge issued to James Ward-Prowse by then-Southampton manager Ralph Hasenhüttl made a huge difference in completing his transformation from being a promising academy graduate into a highly capable senior pro.

The prodigal son returned to St Mary's Stadium on the 28th August, when former captain James Ward-Prowse rejoined Southampton after three years away. Ward-Prowse started his career at St Mary's and has made over 400 club appearances for the Championship club, but he was transferred to West Ham United for £30 million in August 2023.

As a young graduate of the Southampton academy, Ward-Prowse was highly rated, with comparisons being made to the former England captain David Beckham on account of his unerring ability from free-kicks. It's a lot of pressure for a young player to have to deal with, especially as Southampton returned to the Premier League in 2012, just as he was truly starting his senior career.

But words of advice from one of his managers, Ralph Hasenhüttl, helped the player make the transition from being a prodigy into a more established senior player and complete his development into a crucial part of the Saints' line-up, and Ward-Prowse was happy to acknowledge Hasenhüttl for helping to turn his potential into something more concrete.

Ralph Hasenhüttl's advice was crucial in turning James Ward-Prowse into the player that he became

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Speaking to The Guardian in 2020, James Ward-Prowse spoke candidly to journalist David Hytner about the influence that Ralph Hasenhüttl had upon him in making him a more complete player.

Ward-Prowse told Hytner: "I am incredibly proud of being the academy boy and coming through but that only gets you so far." The midfielder had been with the club since he was eight-years-old, but had started to slip down the pecking order at St Mary's prior to the German's arrival in December 2018.

He explained that he reached rock-bottom shortly after Hasenhüttl's arrival, when he was left out of the Saints' 18-player squad for a Premier League trip to Huddersfield Town. "Is my future here with this manager?" Ward-Prowse said that he'd asked himself, "when a new manager comes in, you are filled with the feeling that it can be a new beginning for you and straight away it was like that didn’t exist again."

But Hasenhüttl's advice to the player was clear: be more aggressive. And when Ward-Prowse responded positively to this, he accordingly got his reward. Not only did he scrap his way back to being a regular the Saints' first-team, but by the end of the 2019-20 season he was their captain, and he'd go on to miss just two Premier League games in four seasons for the Saints before his departure from the club following their relegation back to the Championship in 2023.

Ward-Prowse's Southampton return was a very welcome surprise for Saints fans

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James Ward-Prowse arriving on the scene as a player at Southampton coincided with an exciting time for the club. Financial issues had seen the club drop as low as League One by 2009, but two successive promotions fired them all the way back to the Premier League by the summer of 2012.

These were heady days to be a Saints fan. Over four consecutive seasons from 2013 to 2017, they finished 8th, 7th, 6th and 8th in the Premier League, playing two seasons in the Europa League, their first European football since the 2003-04 season.

Ward-Prowse was a full part of that team, but by the time of Ralph Hasenhüttl's arrival at the club in December 2018, he was starting to slip out of the first team. That Huddersfield match, as he confirmed himself, was a low point.

The midfielder, who has also been capped 11 times for the England national team, left the club for West Ham United at the start of the season following their relegation from the Premier League in 2023. The player needed to be in the top-flight, and Southampton were no longer able to offer him that.

But he didn't flourish away from Southampton. He scored seven goals in 37 appearances in his first season at The London Stadium, but at the end of the summer 2024 transfer window he was sent on a season-long loan to Nottingham Forest, only to be recalled to West Ham at the end of the following January's transfer window. After being dropped by Nuno Espirito Santo in September 2025, he was sent on loan again in the January 2026 transfer, this time to Burnley.

Now 31 years of age, Ward-Prowse is back at St Mary's, and after two appearances from the bench, he put in strong performances in his first matches back in their first eleven, providing an assist for the goal in their 1-1 draw at Lincoln City on the 5th September. Saints fans were delighted to see the return of the former academy graduate. He's now a fully-formed senior professional with years of experience under his belt, and Ralph Hasenhüttl's words of advice helped him to complete that transformation.