WILKINSON WAS BORING - BATTY

Batty's career took off after Wilkinson took over at Leeds in 1988, as he played a part in their promotion to the First Division in the FA technical director's first full season at Elland Road and then played a key role in the title-winning side two years later.

However, despite this Batty said he never enjoyed playing under Wilkbinson and described him as "boring, authoritarian, unimaginative and inflexible."

"It was an often strained relationship between Wilko and me," Batty said. "It would be hypocritical of me to claim I enjoyed working for him or that I admired his methods and the way he had us play.

"The truth is I never came to terms with his management style and I constantly rallied against an outlook which I can only describe as schoolmasterly."

"I stayed in the team when Wilko arrived but he dropped me six weeks later and there's no doubt I was entering the most unhappy period of my career to date.

"His harsh and unimaginative training system had come as a shock and I was quickly growing disillusioned with the way we were being told to play.

"Within months, I felt Wilko was trying to knock a lot of the natural aggression and arrogance out of my game. It became a battle of wills between us.Howard had been a teacher and that shone through in his dealings with not only me but all the players.

"He was the authoritarian, do-it-my-way-or-not-at-all type and I just could not respond to that.

"I felt like he was crushing my spirit. It was as if he was attempting to clone me, to fit me robot-like into his vision of the well-oiled machine.

"I could never understand quite what he was driving at. I would sit there in his office, pretending to listen while he droned on, responding with the odd: 'Yes, okay then gaffer' but I hardly heard a word he said."

The former England international, who left Leeds for Blackburn in 1993, said he was particularly disappointed that Wilkinson told him to forget things he learned under former manager, and Leeds' favourite son, the late Billy Bremner.

"He would also tell me that Billy Bremner may have been a great player but he wasn't such a good manager," Wilkinson said.

"I was really indignant at that because Bremner was everything to me."