Managing a newly-promoted team in the Premier League is very demanding, as Frank Lampard is finding out at Coventry. It's the highest level, not just for the technical ability of the players that your team faces but also the sheer physicality that these players possess, and it feels like the gap to the Championship is getting greater every season. From my experience in the same situation, you have to be really smart in the way you approach each game and recognise the importance of preparation for each specific opponent, because your team has to be organised in possession, and definitely out of possession.
Teams in the Premier League counter-attack with greater efficiency so being solid behind your own attacking play is absolutely vital. But the real advice I would give to managers in Frank's shoes is to manage yourself, and your own time, as well as your players. By that I mean you have to try to stay fresh and positive, because invariably you are going to go on bad runs of defeats like Coventry are on, which can drag your mood down.
I can tell you now that, whoever you are playing, if you get beaten - and especially beaten heavily like Coventry were by Brighton on Sunday - then it resonates with you. It's the same for every manager. For Frank, whether it is losing at home to Hull or Brighton, or against Arsenal and Manchester City, then it will hurt.
But it is how he deals with those defeats that will decide what happens next. Being the leader of a group of young men, you cannot look washed out and empty on a Monday morning after a heavy loss. Yes, inside you will be hurting and your pride will be taking a bashing but everyone at the club will be waiting for your reaction, and will act accordingly.
Walking into the training ground in a dark mood and with your head around your backside just does not work, irrespective of what you are feeling inside. I've been in that situation many times myself as a manager and what you have to do is puff your chest out and find a way of getting everyone back on track and working even harder with a set focus on the next game. That's what all good leaders do.
It is draining at times, but that is why managing your time and prioritising the issues that you can resolve is so important. When I took Stoke up to the Premier League in 2008, I was learning on my feet. We did not make a great start and I had to roll my sleeves up and get on with what I'd got in my squad, and really focus on getting results.
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