Gary Lineker Quotes

As a coach, you've got to do what's best for the team. If guys don't like it, they're going to leave. If they stay and don't like it, well, your team's going to suck anyway. Even if this happens, you still have to do it. You can't coach worrying about any individual.

Watch the old man. Watch how the old man keeps the guys who aren't playing happy.

Our coach was absolutely out of his head. He must have read Bear Bryant's book. We had 78 players out. The first day 35 quit. Twenty quit the second day. We ended with 17 players. It was depressing.

From our perspective, the most important thing is what you do with the players, how you handle them, your ability to communicate with them.

Pellegrini gave me back the joy of playing football. He is like Arsene Wenger: someone who likes to joke, someone who likes to talk and take an interest in your life.

We have to make the players who haven't played matches feel valued.

My players' feeling is the most important thing for me.

We have to talk about the players we have.

I adapt my idea of football to my players, not adapt my players in my idea of football. It's important because there are others players that must play. The players are the most important things in football. I adapt my idea within my players.

Every game, I have to make the best decision. I repeat: my players must be happy to stay in Chelsea and to play for Chelsea and to play for our fans. They must be happy if they start the game or if they stay on the bench and come on.

Everyone's system in the NBA makes sense. It all comes down to the quality of player and the quality of execution.

It's up to the manager where and how every player should play, but I think every player should be comfortable in that position.

Us coaches love to have as many players available as possible.

People often talk about a coach's philosophy, but generally, I think managers look at the players they have and then decide on their style.

Mascherano's impact as a leader is more important inside the squad, and Messi's leadership is more important in the pitch.

Players sometimes need to feel important and loved by the club.

You can't manage every footballer the same. Of course you'd love to, but it doesn't work like that. We're not robots.

The players on the team are the reason why we win. You don't have to treat them all identically; they're not going to be all the same. Your ability to lead and motivate those guys differently is important.

My opinion is always that players need to be happy. You cannot keep them in the squad if they are not happy.

Andre Villas-Boas wasn't the ideal coach for me. He bought Gylfi Sigurdsson and then told me he would be his new No.10.

The amount of staff we have in academies is... I've never seen anything like it. It's good to take care of the players but sometimes I get confused by the number of people who have an impact on one kid - we're talking 100 people or more. It's quite a heavy load.

I have a lot of admiration for those who build tactical systems, but I always thought the most important thing a good coach must do is build the team around the characteristics of his players.

Every team I've played on has players-only meetings, players staff meetings, so this is part of the process.

People talk about the hair dryer and all this with Sir Alex Ferguson. What was really great about him, whatever happened in a game, he would spend whatever minutes it took him to get this out of this system and say whatever needed to be said. Once he said, 'Get your bath,' that was it. We knew that it would never return.

You don't know a player until you coach him.