EMILE Heskey won’t stop speaking his mind – and that might be good news for Neil Lennon and Wanderers.

The big striker looked to have landed himself in hot water a fortnight ago when he suggested his manager could be a suitable candidate for the then-vacant Aston Villa job.

Asked whether Lennon would be a good fit for the Midlanders, Heskey said his current boss was “tailor made for a big club” and is sticking by his statement.

“I was asked for my opinion and I gave it,” he told The Bolton News. “They wanted to know if the gaffer was suitable, so what do I say? No?

“I can only be honest. They asked me about bringing confidence to the squad and I can only tell the truth. I don’t think any knuckle rapping was needed.”

With Wanderers now sliding down the table, the former England target man’s candidness could be just what his side need to snap them out of their current malaise.

Heskey seized the captain’s armband in the second half at the Riverside on Tuesday, a position he once filled briefly for England.

And while it is not a role he is particularly familiar with, the 37-year-old is happy to lead by example if he is asked to do so.

“It’s not something I’m really used to, I’ve probably only done it a couple of times but I am the senior member of the squad so if the manager needs me then so be it,” he said.

“People look up to me but it doesn’t matter who’s got the armband on really, we should have 11 leaders out there, we should all be giving an input.

“You want everyone to have a say in what is going on out there.”

Wanderers slipped to 19th in the Championship with defeat at the Riverside, and Heskey admits it has been tough to witness the rapid decline in the last few weeks.

“It’s hard not to notice the table,” he said. “I think if we play like we did against Middlesbrough we’ll be okay.

“You’ve got to try every trick in the book and I’ve learned a few from some of the best.

“Sometimes you go into game knowing you’re not expected to get anything at all, you’re not favoured, but you draw on that experience and try to get the best out of what you have got.

“When I came in the first thing I saw was that the manager was getting the best out of the lads, they were playing out of their skins.

“We’ve dropped off a bit but they are doing okay, hopefully I can help improve that.”

Heskey had been sidelined with a hamstring injury since the 0-0 FA Cup draw at Liverpool, and his absence alongside that of Craig Davies has left Wanderers “lightweight” in the opinion of his manager.

And though his return to the team did not prevent the Whites from slipping to a third consecutive defeat, Heskey feels the team can take something from their performance.

“You have to stay positive and it was great the manager had faith in me, putting me straight in,” he said.

“We have to take that performance as motivation. No one deliberately goes out there to have a bad game but sometimes you have to come off the pitch, look at yourself and then it’s about how you go again, what drive you have got.

“And obviously you don’t want to get on the wrong side of the manager.

“I think it was a big improvement on Saturday at Forest. The message we got before the game was basically that it couldn’t happen again. Too many people had an off-day.

“Sometimes you can afford to carry one or two but when it’s too many it’s not good enough, especially in front of a travelling crowd. We let them down.

“I think we earned a bit of respect back. We showed real fight and purpose, so if we play like that until the end of the season we’ll be okay.”

After the highs of the FA Cup games against Liverpool, Wanderers have struggled to find consistency. But Heskey believes back-to-back home games against Brighton and Reading come at a good time to improve the club’s fortunes.

“We’ve done reasonably well so far at home, now we want to make that a bit more solid. We’d like to go on a run now,” he said.

“I think it is sometimes a bit difficult to come down from that kind of high we had at Liverpool. It’s a very different type of game in the Championship.

“I think some performances have been reasonable. Last week wasn’t acceptable but I think we got back a bit at Middlesbrough.”