Just like

So what is proper conduct for a football manager?

From Monday-Friday I think it's the same as anyone else in society.

However, for that hour and a half period, under the massive spotlight of the Premiership, it changes somewhat.

Admittedly events at the end of the West Ham v Arsenal fixture were unusual to say the least, probably because they are so rare.

But, if you analyse the situation, it's a wonder it doesn't happen more often.

I think one would have had to have been a manager to fully understand the many highs and lows you go through during a game.

In the ideal world you can manage to appear like the swan which floats along gracefully, while underneath its little legs are racing ten to the dozen.

For most of the time Arsene Wenger, particularly, falls into that category.

But the incident, which of course no one can condone, proved that he is no different underneath.

The fact is that few of the top managers in the Premiership are doing the job week in week out just for the money.

In some ways the fact they can still get so wound up and passionate when some people may have become complacent proves how invaluable they are in the first place.

The comparisons with events say ten or 20 years ago are hard to make in so far as, most of the time, we could sit in the dugouts without the television camera zooming in. Usually only two or three games were selected to be covered each week.

Such is the need to win for clubs now, the tensions and pressures spill over from the terraces, through the boardrooms and inevitably finish up mainly on the pitch but particularly the manager's bench.

Alan Pardew is one of the small group who will read each week that the bookmakers are tipping them to be first out the door this season.

He has, with due respect, not achieved enough in the game as a manager at the highest level to guarantee that, should he leave West Ham, he will automatically be lined up for other Premiership jobs.

The turmoil behind the scenes in his club at times has made him look like a manager in name only, with players arriving from South America without apparently his knowledge and with takeover talks still ongoing.

He, like the rest of us, will read that, if and when it all happens, some other manager will automatically be brought in.

With all of this happening, I defy anyone not to get excited when his team, who let's face it would have taken a 0-0 draw against Arsenal as some sort of success at present, came up with a last-minute winner.

Where he was wrong, and I am sure he will be admitting it himself, was to jump up and down punching the air to his left-hand side - where very close to his area were the Arsenal manager and staff.

Had he done the same thing in the other direction, or even behind him engulfed by his own bench staff, Mr Wenger would still not have liked it but could have well understood it.

If, however, Alan's antics were accompanied by comments such as take that, you so and so' most people could understand Arsene's reaction, bearing in mind that while he would have not been too happy with one away point, to see even that snatched away would bring out all of those feelings of a whole week's work gone down the drain.

He also realised as well that teams such as Chelsea and Manchester United, with whom they are always bracketed, were further away at this stage of the season.

So what should happen?

It is certainly right that the FA step in to pacify if nothing else those who would say: "If this sort of thing was let go we might well see a form of all-in wrestling by the end of the season."

I smile when I look back to some of the confrontations I had in my day, usually out of the glare of the television.

Probably the only one who seriously offered me up the tunnel was the late Bob Stokoe when he was managing our opponents of today, Sunderland, at Roker Park.

The trainer's dugouts there were, as I remember, further apart than on most grounds.

This was probably done on purpose because Bob would regularly make the journey from his to the visiting manager's and, fortunately, by the time he got there the fists had been lowered. He still always entertained you with a choice comment or two!

Messers Clough and Taylor at Forest probably employed mind games long before the present regime but they were usually tinged with humour.

I am amused when I read about certain managers who do not have the traditional after-match drink in the home manager's office, no matter what the score.

Cloughie did it the opposite way around - he used to ask for a brandy before the game!

I remember he once sent an apprentice he had brought with him to The Dell up to my office at about 2pm asking that I provide two brandies for him and Peter Taylor.

I sent the lad back with a message they could have a cup of tea like everyone else and they had to come upstairs to get it.

The next time I saw them was on the touchline and, as I shook hands, Cloughie smiled at me, and gave me his usual hug, with an aroma surrounding him which was certainly not PG Tips.

I found out that when the apprentice took my message back to him, he promptly said go further up the corridor and knock on the door which has directors' written on it.

His chairman, probably thinking the alcohol was for medicinal purposes, sent down a whole bottle.

A trip to Anfield was another experience, where sometimes the visit to the bootroom after the game was far more enjoyable than the mauling the visiting team had received in the 90 minutes from the best team in Europe at the time.

But the humour, not just from the terraces but also from a bench with the likes of Shankly, Paisley, Fagan and company shouting congratulations etc if you actually managed to get a corner against them, made the game that much different then.

So what should the FA do? Obviously remind the managers of their position in the game's society with so many youngsters watching.

There will obviously be regrets from both sides, particularly Arsene who represents a club of such fine traditions. He will feel he has let them down, but it is a reminder that no matter how many trophies anyone has won, how many games you have managed in, the common denominator of all managers is the will to win.

If ever that is lost it's time to hang up the boots.