Slaven Bilic has denied the suggestion he is too nice.  “I don’t see myself as an especially nice guy,” he told Bianca Westwood on Soccer Saturday

“I also can lose my temper and I was doing that very recently – or last season. When I feel it’s needed, I do that. I think I have it [a fear factor]. I am motivated, I am hungry and the lads know if they don’t perform they ain’t going to play and that is the biggest punishment for them.

“You can’t say that no matter how the players are playing that they are playing. That’s not the case. A lot of players, if they don’t perform well, they are losing their place in the team.

“That has always been and is always going to be the biggest punishment for the players.

“I’m demanding a lot from the players. I don’t want them to be afraid, of course, I want them to stay confident. I don’t see that as a problem.

“If, for you, being hard or being a rocket means I am going to slag the players here in front of the cameras then I’m definitely not one of them – but then, I don’t know who is like that in football nowadays – and I don’t want to be like that.”