“But clubs like Leicester and Derby have remained in the top flight and spent sensibly rather than frivolously. “You need discipline and you want to get your team playing for the supporters And that’s what Graham has done,” enthused Sir Elton. “If it’s half-time and we’re losing 1-0, you don’t think `f…’ You know with Graham we’ve still got a good chance Yes,” he rubbed his hands mock-rapaciously, “we’re OK. If people thought I was back just to draw my pension, I’ve made it very clear that is not the case.”Taylor spent just over a year “upstairs” at Watford, before taking over from Kenny Jackett, who stayed on as coach, in May “General manager wasn’t for me,” Taylor insisted. “I looked out of the window on to the pitch and knew that’s where I should be.” Fourth place in the First Division suggests it was a shrewd transition for all concerned.

“They had trust in me to sort out all the problems at the club That in itself brings its own kind of expectancy. By then, people would have seen a failed England manager, a failed Wolves manager and thought `that must be comfortable for him’. It was just taken away from me because of the pressure that always exists at Molineux. Yet, I knew what we were building, with players like Robbie Keane coming through.”When Sir Elton persuaded Taylor to return, Watford were expecting something rather more than a prodigal son.

It has taken some getting over, and I have had to make sure that the major professional disappointment in my life hasn’t affected everything else. I think I’ve dealt with it quite well.”If the Premiership aspirants Wolves appeared a suitable depository for the talents of a man who had exhibited a proven acumen for achieving promotion with Watford – a Fourth Division club when the former Grimsby and Lincoln full-back became manager in 1977 – it was to prove a frustratingly truncated experience “My biggest regret was not seeing out my contract at Wolves. If I could change anything to rectify things it was to change those draws at home into wins.”I can’t live with all of the things said, because some of it was very personal, but I’m not bitter I would be a very sad man if I allowed that to happen. People talk about it being lost in Norway and in Holland, but in hindsight it wasn’t; it was lost at home to Norway and at home to Holland, when we failed to win.

“Nobody will convince me that, at any one time, I will not come across the tattooed man with the pint of beer in his hand, and I don’t want that in my life or have it inflicted on my wife.”For an intrinsically decent man, that failure to qualify for USA 94 will never be exorcised, though when he can be persuaded to discuss his memories, you sense it becomes a cathartic experience. It is as though by reliving Dennis Bergkamp’s marvellous goal, with England leading Holland 2-0, and the penalty equaliser five minutes from time the anguish will eventually abate.”I can still tell you precisely the build-up. It is a stewardship that will not be easily expunged from the memory, least of all his own. He maintains that he feels no animosity towards his detractors; yet one legacy is that, for the moment anyway, he will not attend England matches. “If a newspaper wishes to put a turnip on my head, and call me a turnip, I can live with that except it encourages other people to treat me like shit,” he said. You must do what you enjoy and come back to the environment where you’re loved.’” It was over five years ago that Taylor, 54, resigned from his England post.For all some of his most acerbic critics cared, he was no more than a root vegetable left to decompose in a dung-heap his own failings.