Tom English: Steve Kean ‘forfeits’ his sense

STEVE Kean, the beleaguered Blackburn manager, clearly wasn’t born with the same capacity for cunning as some of his fellow Glaswegians currently operating in Premiership hot-seats.

Kean’s team have one win from 13 games and are bottom of the league. Their fans are up in arms. Barely a week goes by without some form of protest against the Scot.

On Tuesday night, Blackburn were knocked out of the Carling Cup by Cardiff. Kean fielded a weakened team and said he “forfeited” the game because Blackburn have some big matches coming up in the Premiership. “We are in a position where we have forfeited going through and having the chance to reach a cup final,” he said. “

It was an extraordinary statement. To forfeit is to surrender, to give up, to submit. That’s a fine message to send to the fans and to the players he picked on Tuesday, David Goodwillie and Grant Hanley among them. He sent them out there suspecting they weren’t good enough and that he was forfeiting the game. To think it might be understandable, to say it is utterly stupid. What a confidence boost for the boys to hear their own manager talk this way.

Kean is a step closer to the exit. And he’s just forfeited the right to complain should he be sacked.