Football: Howard Wilkinson: Words from a previous incarnation

1995 If I am ever reincarnated, I'd like to return as a personality

1989

Don't ask me whether it was a good game. It'd be like asking a surgeon if it was a good operation

1995

There's only two types of manager. Those who've been sacked and those who will be sacked in the future

1993

I'm healthy, I've got a house, I eat well - how can I be unhappy? There's thousands with none of these things

1992

Journalists arrived from all over Europe to meet him [Eric Cantona]. He gave interviews on art, philosophy and politics. A natural room-mate for David Batty, I thought immediately (before the rift with Cantona)

1993

The England manager has to fight the system and the press from day one

1990

A myth has grown up that football should in some way strive to be entertaining. Sport is not entertainment. It's an activity for the benefit of the participants. If you run away from that you risk having the wrong pipers calling the tune

1996

A manager is not self-employed. If he's not in the directors' hands, he's in the players' hands. And if he's not in the players' hands, he's in the fans' hands (days before sacking by Leeds)

1992

Life has to be lived forwards, but can only be viewed backwards (slogan on Hoddle's office wall)

... and how others see him

1996

Wilko for England! Leeds fans' chant during 5-0 defeat at Liverpool

1991

There are bigger heads than mine in the First Division. Howard Wilkinson's springs to mind Brian Clough

1999 At the end [of his team talks] we'd be thinking: `Eh?' David Batty

1996

Batty is a really good player, a good passer. Howard Wilkinson curbed his style at Leeds, made Batts more disciplined than expansive

Kenny Dalglish

1992

There's a great deal of psychology involved in running a football team and Howard understands the psyche of the modern player better than most.

Howard Kendall, after Leeds' Championship season

1994

His comments were strange and rather incoherent. One moment he would tell me that he wants me to know that I owe everything to him, that I am only a Frenchman lost in the English League, and at other times he would say that without me, the team is nothing

Eric Cantona

1992

Preparation was, and still is, an obsession with Wilkinson... At Wednesday, I got the impression he thought he could transform a squad of competent players into a team capable of competing with the best. He also believed he could transform the fortunes of problem players

Lee Chapman

1998

I know it sounds nuts, but I thought I was signing for Howard Kendall. He was the only Howard I'd really heard of

Vinnie Jones