COSGROVE: OUR MANAGERS SHOULD SPEAK UP OR SHUT UP

GEORGE BURLEY'S dramatic departure from Hearts has shone a torch on the modern role of management NowadaysSPL bosses are expected to move effortlessly from the boot room to the boardroom.It is a gulf fewcan easily cross.

This season hasbeen particularly disappointing.The Premiership in England has the supremely arrogant Jose Mourinho,aman that could start a fight in an empty house.

This week he had a go at the Johan Cruyff saying he has nothing to offer football because all he does is 'play golf and criticise'.The same could be said of Kenny Dalglish but no Scottish manager will say it.

Gordon Strachan is a famous exception.He will shoot from the hip. But beyond Strachan and the refreshingly honest Yogi Hughes, managers in the SPL are often cautious beyond belief.

How many times have you been virtually bored into submission as an SPL manager explained away a narrow home defeat? Once the referee has had his customary slighting it very quickly descends into mind-numbing cliche.

Maybe it's the old-fashioned code of discipline that still holds court in Scottish football but managers seem incapable of speaking the truth.Blaming the ref is just a lack of vocabulary,an easy target when there are so many other thoughts simmering in the mind.

But talk to a manager away from the gaze of publicity and they will come up with a myriad different reason why their team lost, from match-fixing to black magic.Show them a microphone and they will resort to some unnamed defender being naive at the back post.

Football bosses also have an amazing loyalty to each other,as if they are part of a professional coven that cannot tell the truth.

Motherwell's Terry Butcher is one of the greatest dissemblers of our age.You could listen to him for a decade and barely smell a whiff of controversy.The former England captain was schooled at an academy of blandness and carefully protects his status in the game.Never in the history of football has a man 'admired the opposition',quite as often as Tel.

This season has brought a new dimension to managerial cliche and the man we have to thank for the fresh approach is Livingston's struggling new boss Paul Lambert.

His career as a player and the much-admired Champions League medal in his china cabinet, gives hima status few Scottish club managers can match. With a reputation behind him,and Old Firm credentials to boot,you can almost hear the clench of embarrassment when his peers are asked who is likely to be relegated?

Unable to say the word Livingston,they shift uneasily round the subject and finally agree it's way too early to say.The bookies disagree - they are quite clear on the matter - the favourites for relegation are Livingston.

The next time the subject is raised just watch the slight twitch on the face of the boss in question. Most will mutteraway for a bit until they regain composure.Then they say one thing 'if anyonecan get it right, it's Paul Lambert This has got to be the most unproven cliches of recent times. Onwhat basis are we to believe that Paul Lambert will get it right? Great players often makepoor managers.Teams that start slowly often endup in trouble.And for all their remarkable achievements in the last 10 years heritage hardly guarantees Livingston a place in the SPL.

If we are to believe the current management cliche that Paul 'will get it right' then what does that say about Jim Leishman? Is he therefore fatally doomed? If so,say so. If one manager will 'get it right', then as sure as chimps like tea, another manager will presumably 'get it wrong'.

Unless,of course,the SPL are up to one of their old tricks and relegation will be suspended yet again.

Football more than any other industry has invented an entire language geared to saying nothing.

Mealy-mouthed managers are proof that the game does not like free speech.The fear of saying something interesting may be an age-old fear of bringing the game into disrepute or maybe just a conspiracy of politeness.Either way it makes for pretty dull TV.

We should lift the polite gagging order that history has placed on post-match interviews and let managers really speak the truth

Taken from the Daily Record