Now assistant manager at Scottish League One tryhards Partick Thistle, Butcher has again defended his record while in Sydney.

And as he was circled by Scottish reporters, he blasted: "All these friendly faces...not like those Australian press bastards."

Butcher is terrified he will only be remembered for failing to retain Sydney's Championship winning form while with the club.

He still insists he can't speak out about what went on until his final contract payment from Sydney is made.

But he hints that as soon as it is, he will be lifting the lid on his tumultuous year in Oz.

"People look and don't exactly know what went on out there," he told the Scottish press at the weekend.

"I can't discuss what went on to a certain degree because of confidentiality...I think the final payment is due any minute now, which will be quite nice.

"I have got to be careful. If you don't do well at a club, or if the club moves you on or if you leave, people can always say he didn't do this and he didn't do that.

"I thought we did well at Sydney in terms of the situation within and outside the club. To get to the finals was an achievement with what we had to contend with.

"Before I got there I was labelled a long-ball coach and that really hurt because when you were brought up watching Ispwich for 20 years and this is how you learned to play, you are certainly not that.

"One sportswriter, and I use the term loosely, said I'd turned Sydney FC into Motherwell. I wish I had because we would have done very well and played some good football.

"The fans were brilliant to me and, contrary to one or two reports, my relationship with the players was very good. One of the players did tell me to f*** off in a game, but I left him out of the next one and we became good colleagues."

Despite his troubled times in the A-League, Butcher still believes he was given a chance to live the perfect life.

"Living and working in Sydney was ideal; it is paradise out there," he admitted, confessing he indulged his passion for the local red wine.

"I think they keep all the best bottles for themselves and send the crap ones over here.

"People could say the only way was down for a team that won the championship, but it was a great experience working abroad and in a different league in a different country.

"Even one that is English speaking and where they drive on the same side of the road. From that experience, I am a better person. I would have loved for it to have been longer but it has certainly made me feel hungrier."

But more than anything, Butcher is delighted to be back in the UK.

"It is nice to be here and to be in a country where football is the number one sport; it makes a huge difference," he said.

"Everyone talks about football here, but in Australia they rarely do. When you see people decked out in sports shirts they are all rugby league.

"I have had a few setbacks and will always take the positives. As a very young manager at Coventry, the chairman changed and he wanted his own man in.

"It was hard at Sunderland to become a player, then a player-manager. I think what I did at Motherwell was a result of those setbacks and how determined I was the same things wouldn't happen again.

"People could say he's very much damaged goods again and it hasn't worked out, but I'd like to think in Scotland in particular people saw what we did at Motherwell.

"It didn't go according to plan at Sydney, but I learned a lot about myself to stop that from happening again. I hope."