BRIAN CLOUGH sat by his television set and relished Barry Cowan's remarkable exploits against Pete Sampras amid Wimbledon's creeping shadows on Wednesday evening.

And he wondered if Patrick Vieira might have been watching, too.

He doubted it and, in any case, he knew the Frenchman wouldn't have understood.

He assumes the same could be said for all the other so-called celebrity footballers who aim to please themselves, choose their places of work and opt only for clubs who make the signings that meet their approval and match their ambitions.

"That young man reminded everybody who watched him about the meaning and purpose of sport," Clough said yesterday.

"He didn't have a chance against the best in the business and, two sets adrift, he didn't have a hope.

"Apart from doing what every sportsman and woman should be expected to do in even the most daunting circumstances. Their best.

"There was only one opponent on the other side of the net but that lad must have felt surrounded. But he was true to himself and to the game that offers him a living.

"He played for self respect. He defied all the odds against him. He fought the champion and drove him to the ropes.

"He found something extra and something special from somewhere and for a moment or two he found himself within a few blows of glory.

"He was an honour to himself and to his profession. He gladdened my heart and it needed it because English football at the moment fills me with despair. We're in danger of killing off the game that's been my life."

The Vieira issue has incensed the man. A player criticising his manager for the quality of his signings, questioning his club's status and declaring his intention to leave despite three years of a contract to run.

It has touched every raw nerve of Clough's body.

"Wherever I look, whatever I read, there is a footballer laying the law down," he complained.

"The Vieira business is the last straw. When I think of that lad I feel like a matador. Somebody has got to take the bull by the horns.

"I hear of players saying their club is not thinking big enough. Turning down a transfer because they will only join a club that's qualified for the Champions League.

"In Vieira's case, he doesn't rate a couple of Arsene Wenger's signings, apparently. He wants a club where he's going to win medals.

"When I think of him I think of bad apples and you know what has to be done with them. They have to be chucked out of the barrel.

"The attitude of some top players nowadays smacks of do it my way or else!

"Who the hell does Vieira think he is? Arsenal are bigger than him. Of course they are. Hartlepool are bigger than him. But neither are bigger than his head!"

Clough added: "If ever Vieira gets the chance to set foot inside Highbury again, when he walks past the bust of Herbert Chapman he'll see it move. Old Herbert will ignore him. He'll look the other way.

"Because here is a player who is abusing a great club. A club and a manager who brought him from nowhere and turned him from a relative nobody into a good player-but still not half as good as he thinks he is. You know the first ambition of any player worth his salt? A win in the next match. That's where ambition starts.

"I gave my players a version of the same message at ten-to-three every Saturday. 'I would shoot my granny right now for three points this afternoon'.

"They knew how important it was to give everything in the cause of victory. Every time. That's why my granny enjoyed more lives than any cat.

"Ambition? If that lad Vieira is talking about genuine ambition, the kind that can help a team, then I'm afraid I've got news for him. His own ambition is on the wane.

"He's like so many others today. They don't need to spend a quid on a lottery ticket. They just have to kick a ball from A to Z because they know there is so much money coming their way from television.

"That's why the transfer fees have rocketed out of all proportion. I see Dutchmen switching clubs for absolute fortunes. You could buy every tulip and daffodil bulb in Holland for the price of a centre-half nowadays. No wonder Van Gogh cut off his ear. He spent years trying to sell masterpiece paintings.

"If he was still alive and seeing what we're seeing in football, he would cut off his head!"

Clough has nothing but sympathy for Arsene Wenger, a manager he believes has not only raised Arsenal's profile but inspired some of the most attractive and effective football their fans have ever seen.

He went on: "Mind you, Wenger has been put to the test, now. He is obliged to deal with the Vieira issue and deal with it emphatically. He could start by passing the player a copy of the English dictionary and pointing to the meaning of the word contract.

"He can ask him to honour the one he was happy to sign. I assume he signed it willingly, that nobody stood over him with a truncheon.

"He can ask him to honour it, he can plead with him. He can offer him a massive bonus for winning the league title. He can even beg. But only once. And if the player still says he wants out, then Wenger should get rid. Get him out of the club so quickly that his feet don't touch the ground. Don't pay for the taxi, either.

"Don't even let him take his boots because he won't have bought them, anyway.

"Now you may say this is only giving the player what he wants and, in one way, it is.

"But it's also telling him - and sending out the message to others - that he's not wanted.

"That the club demands more commitment, more appearances, more faith and, yes, more ambition than he's prepared to give.

"You exhaust every possibility, convince yourself you can do no more - and then turf him through the door.

"This is the cricket season, for heaven's sake. And Wimbledon. Wenger should be enjoying his holidays, sipping a glass of wine in Paris.

"No manager should be having to worry about a multi-millionaire player with a grouse.

"There are times when I miss the involvement with football. But, on occasions like this, I'm glad I'm out of it."