BOBBY Robson once said: "I do want to play the short ball and I do want to play the long ball. I think long and short balls is what football is all about."

That's vintage Bobby. To be fair though, he's not alone with most managers being prone to the odd gaff or emotional rant.

There's Kevin "'That would have been a goal if it wasn't saved" Keegan. And Jose ""Please don't call me arrogant, but I'm European champion and I think I'm a special one" Mourinho. How about Rafa's epic rant against Fergie this season? It went on for like 12 minutes!

In fact, the managerial outburst is the classic tell tale sign of the immense pressure their under and the passion they have for the game. But what about our HAL coaches? Are they too susceptible to such emotion charged tirades? Well, Viddie is obviously...Anyway, I thought I'd take a closer look at some of the more colourful remarks from our coaches in HAL v4.

What better place to start than Aurelio Vidmar last week saying "Because of a piss-ant town this club will never win anything until you get rid of that crap (referring to politics and hidden agendas)". The battle was lost weeks ago." Hard to argue with that Viddie - especially the piss-ant town bit.

John Kosmina could fill a football quote book, but I liked his reason for Sydney's failure this year "There's a 100 different little reasons why. The little things add up to big things. By the time the snowball gets to the bottom of the hill it's as big as a football stadium... It's just the way the universe is at the moment." Maybe his next job could be as a horoscope columnist?

I also dig how Frank Farina wants to talk in secret code after receiving a fine from the FFA this year: "The biggest lesson to come out of it is make sure you don't tell the truth. You guys (the media) most probably won't know exactly what I'm saying half the time from now on in." Not sure any of us knew anyway...

Then there's David Mitchell escaping reality after Perth got smashed with "I actually said in the dressing room, people who weren't here would probably say we got battered 4-1 by Queensland, but that's not the case," and Gary Van Egmond calling Adrian Trinidad a diver by not calling him a diver, "I'm not saying he's a diver, I'm saying he may have run into Jado and he's fallen over."

Lawrie McKinna was quite tame this year but did royally sledge his own player after a stupid foul with "Hopefully whoever comes in next week does a good job and Heff doesn't get back in the team, he doesn't deserve to after ill-discipline like that." Ouch - but you gotta respect that honesty.

Stoic in demeanour, Ernie Merrick, is even more dry with his media comments. It's just not his style. Ernie prefers the more considered approach. A good example would be his veiled attack on assistant referees and their offside calls... "I'm not suggesting it's bias or incompetence. I'm just hoping the assistant referees are really good at their job, particularly on offsides...I hope that doesn't affect our opportunities in the finals." Come on Ernie, fire up - punch a wall or something.

Coaches obviously make these comments because they're under the pump. They're copping it from everywhere to get results - the board, media, sponsors, supporters - and this year, we've definitely seen our fair share of coach clashes and bewildering comments. I actually reckon it's a pretty good indicator of the development of our league.

That stakes are high (and getting higher). The pressure is mounting. No doubt there's some positive correlation between the amount of money in a league versus the number of crazy comments we hear from coaches. If that really is the case, then I for one, am more than happy to hear them!

*I'd be interested to hear some of your favourite lines (owners, coaches, players) from the HAL this year.

Tristram is a Victory fan and wishes he could say that a knee injury curtailed his promising football career.