Home truths keep Holloway grounded

On the Premiership:The FA Cup turned green last week. Lower-league standard-bearers are always guaranteed special treatment on quarter-final weekend but in a tournament that has largely been insulated from shocks this year, Plymouth pulled particularly hard on the neutral supporters' heartstrings.

The chaos began in earnest last Thursday, with a six-hour media day, and built steadily in a crescendo until 6pm yesterday, when Home Park was a bulging, boisterous, bouncing mass of humanity. It was a glorious throwback to the days when the only things flat about the FA Cup were the caps worn by those who squeezed onto the terraces.

Perhaps the only man keeping his head amid the madness was Ian Holloway. The Plymouth manager had never reached the last eight before - never ever been close, in fact - but, unlike so many of his professional peers, he has never struggled to stick to Kipling's old dictum about dealing with triumph and disaster.

Equanimity comes easily to Holloway. He has four children, all riotous, unruly teenagers, three of whom are profoundly deaf. Chloe, Eve and Harriet keep dad's feet firmly planted in Devon's red soil and he is grateful for it.

When the final whistle sounded last night, he immediately sought them out in the directors' box.

Holloway is ambitious. He dearly wants to manage in the Premiership, although he suspects his heavy Bristol accent - like one of the Wurzels gargling with Scrumpy - might deter some of the league's more po-faced chairmen.

His fears are well-founded, although the problem lies less in his elongated vowels and more in his humdrum profile. As a player, Holloway was the quintessential journeyman pro while his notable managerial accomplishments have invariably been overshadowed by a buffoonish public persona.

What a pity. The Premiership is in dire need of characters like Holloway, if only to prick its sense of self-importance. Can you imagine 'Ollie', eyes bulging and nostrils flared, confronting a member of West Ham's Baby Bentley brigade? Or attempting to drum a sense of sportsmanship and perspective into one of Arsenal's spoiled young brats? They are both delicious scenarios, but both doomed to remain in the realm of fantasy.

As Holloway can confirm, there is more to life than points and prizes. But the 21st-century Premiership footballer has lived such a cossetted existence that this point has become submerged in a deluge of Rolex watches and mock-Tudor mansions.

Academies teach the need for a balanced diet and careful conditioning of body and mind, but forget the life skills. Then, clubs are so determined to pamper and protect their most precious assets that players become utterly helpless.

Mark Maunders, Fulham's former press officer, tells a good story about one of the club's new signings ringing him in the middle of the night, panic-stricken at having woken up covered in water. Maunders duly investigated, and discovered the source of the leak to be an open window above the player's bed.

Decision-making is now an alien process to many elite players. They are told what to eat, and when; how to train and what to say to the media. And at every turn, tabloid tub thumping and round-the-clock coverage on Sky Sports News - where Wayne Rooney breaking a fingernail will generate the sort of journalistic delirium usually reserved for the outbreak of war - merely reinforce the sense of their own significance.

Invariably, it is the players who grew up outside the protective cocoon provided by so many English clubs that have most to say. Tucked away in the back pages last week was a recollection from Andre Bikey, the Cameroonian defender, about having to carry a gun, for fear of racist attacks, while living in Moscow. In January, Ulises de la Cruz decided to spend a significant chunk of his salary rebuilding his home village of Piquiucho in Ecuador.

It is no coincidence both men play for Reading. In an industry characterised by sickly self-regard, Steve Coppell, the Royals manager, is the equivalent of a freezing cold shower. A university graduate with a vast range of interests outside football, he is resolutely dismissive of Premiership hyperbole and has fostered a similarly unassuming attitude among his dedicated squad.

At first glance, Coppell seems to be the anti-Holloway. If Reading's manager occasionally struggles to even raise a sardonic eyebrow in press conferences, Holloway resembles a toddler who has just seen away a King-Sized Mars bar, washed down by Red Bull. Watching him on the touchline can cause motion sickness; listening to him can make your ears bleed.

But they are both acutely aware that the significance of football - that most glorious of trivialities - should never be overstated. And if last week's hullabaloo made Holloway forget that, the welcome he received from Chloe, Eve and Harriet will have put him straight.