IT WAS once said of Brian Clough that the nearest he would come to being a coach was if they took all his teeth out and put seats in.

He didn't so much coach footballers as coerce them, bully them almost, but his powers of motivation certainly achieved results.

Brian Close was of similar name and similar sentiments, once observing: "They don't need a coach, they need a kick up the backside."

Yet modern professional sport is awash with coaches, many of them trying to justify their existence by spouting meaningless technical jargon. So how refreshing it was for Tim Henman to reach a new peak in his career at a time when he has decided to dispense with the services of a coach.

With his head uncluttered by excessive advice, he was clear about what he was trying to do in the Tennis Masters event in Paris, and although he only beat a Romanian fisherman in the final his previous list of scalps was impressive enough to justify another bout of Henmania when Wimbledon comes round again.

Cynics will say the likes of Roddick, Federer and Grosjean were tired at the end of the season and were more intent on winning the big finale, the Tennis Masters Cup starting in Houston tomorrow.

But Henman has beaten Roddick twice since bowing to Grosjean in the Wimbledon quarter-finals and it seems that his steady improvement since last winter's shoulder surgery is still continuing.

Perhaps he has also been inspired by the birth of his daughter, but whatever the major factors his Paris triumph has lifted him to 14th in the world ranking from his low point of 40th.

At 29 perhaps he can still Wimbledon. We should give him the benefit of the doubt one more time.

FOR Colin Montgomerie it is almost certainly too late. He continues to vie with Phil Mickelson for the title of best current golfer never to have won a Major, but continuing to fill his head with silly ideas in his quest for the holy grail is clearly not helping.

He is not one to rush out and find a new coach when things go wrong, but just over a week ago he was extolling the virtues of his new putting technique, which involved looking at the hole instead of the ball.

This sounds pretty crazy and it cannot have worked for long because at Valderrama lass Saturday he stormed off the ninth green after missing a birdie putt, leaving playing partner Thomas Bjorn to wave him a mock goodbye as he waited to hole out.

Coming just after the Royal and Ancient had revised their rules on etiquette, this was an untimely tantrum from Monty, who finished a lowly 28th in the Volvo Order of Merit.

ANY coach in any sport should be able to preach the basic amateur psychology that anger is useful as long as it is controlled.

The sort of channelled aggression which England rugby captain Martin Johnson exudes will be a powerful weapon in his quest for the World Cup, but it is something which far too many footballers seem unable to master.

Peter Reid obviously had good cause for deciding he didn't want Danny Mills in his Leeds team, even though he was prepared to tolerate the similarly headstrong Alan Smith.

Reid must have spotted the difference as epitomised by Mills' appalling antics for Middlesbrough against Wolves, which were far worse than Smith's latest misdemeanour of tossing a plastic bottle back into the crowd.

Smith's was the fairly harmless spur-of-the-moment reaction of a person without the brains to think before he acts; Mills's taunting of Lee Naylor was the pre-meditated act of someone with a large nasty streak. If only that Leeds team which included Smith, Mills, Bowyer, Woodgate, Viduka and Rio Ferdinand had had a disciplinarian like Brian Clough in charge they might have been champions of Europe by now.

THAT footballers don't have a monopoly on brainless behaviour was shown by England flanker Joe Worsley when he was sin-binned against Uruguay.

I suspect he meant no harm when he applauded the England fans as he left the pitch with the victim of his high tackle still stricken on the pitch, but it gave the Aussies yet more ammunition for their favourite pastime of Pom-bashing.

The Australian Press simply saw it as yet another opportunity to have a rant about English arrogance, so it's time we took a hard line with Aussies who want to have their cake and eat it, like New South Wales batsman Phil Jaques.

He scored loads of runs for Northants last season when he could call on an EU-qualification because he hadn't played a first-class game in Australia for two years. Now he is back in the NSW team and is re-classified as an overseas player but is threatening legal action against the England and Wales Cricket Board, claiming restraint of trade.

Hopefully the ECB, and Northants, will tell him to go and jump off Ayers Rock.