Sorry the costliest word for axed Mick

Never apologise, never explain, so they say.

Mick McCarthy may be reflecting ruefully on that bit of advice after he broke with the professional habit of a life-time at Molineux on Sunday.

His toothless Wolves had just beensavaged by West Brom when themanager offered his mea culpa to the mutinous home support via the media.

“I would think it was one of the most disappointing afternoons of my career,” he said. “I apologise for the performance and I’ve never done that before. But the way we capitulated in the last half-hour is not associated with my teams.”

Well, there’s always a first time foreverything and, as it turns out, a last time too, at least for Mick McCarthy asmanager of Wolves. McCarthy’s sackingyesterday was all but inevitable by the time the final whistle put his team out of their misery on Sunday. It’s always bad for a relegation-threatened side to lose. But at home? Against your arch-rivals? And by a humiliating five goals to one?

As the West Brom goals piled up, the furious fans directed their venom at both team and manager, alternating between ‘You’re not fit to wear the shirt’ and ‘You’re getting sacked in the morning’. Hardly music to the ears of chairman Steve Morgan but then he too had crossed a line a couple of weeks ago when — in what, by his own admission, was another first for McCarthy in his managerial career — Morgan entered the dressing room to lambast the players after a 3-0 defeat by Liverpool.

Needless to say, the gaffer wasn’t happy but subsequently claimed that he and his boss had sorted things out.

“I was out with him on at the club’s annual do, he was fine, there’s no problem,” said McCarthy.

But, experienced football man that he is, McCarthy also knew the real score. It ain’t about what happens at the annual do, it’s about what happens on the pitch week-in, week-out.

“If it’s points on the board that’s aproblem, I understand that,” he said. “I live and die by what my team do.”

And with Wolves slipping back into the relegation places on the back of that West Country horror show, the points on the board — just 14 eked out of the last 22 games — all pointed towards the exit door.

Considering that Wolves only escaped the drop by the skin of Stephen Hunt’s teeth on the final day last season and now, once again, find themselves perilously close to a return to the Championship from which Mick McCarthy, to widespread acclaim at the time, rescued them three years ago, the club can hardly be accused of pressing the panic button.

The decision to jettison him might overlook the fact that, at various times, Wolves played far better than their points reward suggested but, in recent weeks — the reprieve of that win over QPR notwithstanding — their performances have betrayed a draining lack of self-confidence emanating from the centre of defence and spreading like a virus throughout the team. And it won’t have helped McCarthy’s cause either that Swansea and Norwich are not onlysurviving but thriving since theirpromotion to the top-flight.

McCarthy has always been admired for the strength of character he has shown as a player and manager, especially in adverse conditions, but even his motivational powers were unable to inspire a panicky team when it all started to go horribly wrong against their local rivals in front of their own disbelieving fans. Four defeats on the trot at home suggests that, for Wolves, Molineux had become more torture chamber than sanctuary.

McCarthy hasn’t earned his goodreputation as a manager by accident, with his achievement in taking the Republic of Ireland to the last 16 of World Cup 2002 the highest of highs, not least because it was fashioned from the debris of the lowest of lows, as the team’s preparations for the final were convulsed by Saipan and all that followed.

However, any hopes he might haveentertained of, perhaps, one day getting a second crack at the Irish job haveprobably been holed below the waterline by this latest painful encounter with the dreaded bacon-slicer.