Sam Allardyce

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Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Thu May 20, 2021 10:47 am

Ok - not strictly Bolton Wanderers related but recently Big Sam revealed we are 'his club'. So I think it belongs here.

Stepped down as WBA boss yesterday even though they wanted him to stay - citing he feels the club needs a long term new manager. Sounded fair enough. But I just watched his interview post match and all does not seem well. Really hope he's ok. Perhaps he'll be down the Unibol to see Ian Evatt's resurgent whites?



Good luck Big man.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Dave Sutton's barnet » Thu May 20, 2021 11:04 am

"I've left football clubs before, but I've never left one that's been so difficult to leave as this."

I wish him all the best, and will always thank him for what he did for us.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Harry Genshaw » Thu May 20, 2021 12:25 pm

Top man but time to retire now. Hope he has a long and happy one.
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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Thu May 20, 2021 12:33 pm

Harry Genshaw wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 12:25 pm
Top man but time to retire now. Hope he has a long and happy one.
I doubt he wants to bow out on a relegation. Hope his health is ok. Think he’s one more job in him.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by boltonboris » Thu May 20, 2021 1:07 pm

I think he wants a rewarding job.

People wanted him to go down with WBA so they can longer have a grudging respect for his record of never getting a team relegated. I'm not sure firefighting is for him anymore

Can see him doing 2 years at Sunlun and handing over the reigns to a younger guy, maybe stay on in some capacity. He was well thought of up there.
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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by TANGODANCER » Thu May 20, 2021 1:08 pm

Great part of Bolton Wanderers history, both as a player and manager, but history is a past tense. I wish him well wherever his path leads. What did Lee Marvin sing in Wandering Star?


"I've never seen a sight that didn't look better looking back" :wink:
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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Bruce Rioja » Thu May 20, 2021 1:33 pm

BWFC_Insane wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 10:47 am
But I just watched his interview post match and all does not seem well.
I can assure you, that's absolutely nothing like the quite prickly interview he gave to MotD's chap, who wouldn't stop asking him as to why he only sees himself as being a short-term manager nowadays.

He's built himself a splendid reputation as being English football's Red Adair, and fair play to him.

If clubs want to pay him a shitload for keeping them up (and this is the only time it hasn't worked) and he gets to spend six months living in his villa then good on him.

Allardyce was quite open in his book as to why he changed club so many times as a player - it was to basically Hoover up the signing on fees. Clearly he now applies a similar principal in his approach to management (only with staying-up bonuses rather than signing-on fees) and as I said, fair play to him, he's earned it.
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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Thu May 20, 2021 2:15 pm

boltonboris wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 1:07 pm
I think he wants a rewarding job.

People wanted him to go down with WBA so they can longer have a grudging respect for his record of never getting a team relegated. I'm not sure firefighting is for him anymore

Can see him doing 2 years at Sunlun and handing over the reigns to a younger guy, maybe stay on in some capacity. He was well thought of up there.
Yeah Sunderland fans loved him. But I can't see why he wouldn't have stayed at West Brom in that case - he basically said he wants a 1 year job. I suspect he'd only work in the premiership again otherwise you'd have thought 2 years at WBA would be ideal.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by GhostoftheBok » Thu May 20, 2021 2:26 pm

Sam would be seen as a good manager were it not for his "brown envelope" reputation. The England one really killed it for him generally, especially with the pundits on TV.

After that people have been desperate for him to fail. He's probably the only manager people in the UK love to hate more than Mourinho.

He'd have taken flak for pragmatic football from people who get all their understanding of the game from MotD and the Sun, but he'd not have been hated without the backhander rep. From the interview it sounds like he's had entirely enough of it now he's had a season where he can't say "up yours, I kept them up again." It's hard to watch people dance on your grave.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Thu May 20, 2021 2:38 pm

GhostoftheBok wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 2:26 pm
Sam would be seen as a good manager were it not for his "brown envelope" reputation. The England one really killed it for him generally, especially with the pundits on TV.

After that people have been desperate for him to fail. He's probably the only manager people in the UK love to hate more than Mourinho.

He'd have taken flak for pragmatic football from people who get all their understanding of the game from MotD and the Sun, but he'd not have been hated without the backhander rep. From the interview it sounds like he's had entirely enough of it now he's had a season where he can't say "up yours, I kept them up again." It's hard to watch people dance on your grave.
Public image as a thing that would matter is way overblown. I doubt he gives a monkeys. I don't think he did much wrong to be honest. I think what annoys him is the media portrayal of 'his football' as I think he believes that is what has held him back from getting bigger jobs.

If we're truthful he made the wrong move from Bolton at the wrong time to the wrong club. Newcastle was never a good choice and really he should have gone earlier - had the chance to manage Villa earlier than that and I suspect it would have suited him and them at the time.

Must make him frustrated that large chunks of modern management such as all the pro zone stats, wearable body monitors, advanced sports science and recovery, cryo chambers, urine analysis etc... that make up the modern game and modern management were things he introduced to English football and at the time everyone laughed at him for. But how ironic that in England Big Sam pretty much invented the whole approach that now rejects him.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Dave Sutton's barnet » Thu May 20, 2021 2:56 pm

Interesting piece (from before he resigned) here from Jonathan Wilson, one of the country's finest writers ('Inverting the Pyramid" et al). As a Sunderland fan, he appreciates Allardyce; as a tactically-minded writer, he thinks Sam has been unfairly underestimated.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/bl ... bion-proud

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Thu May 20, 2021 3:07 pm

Dave Sutton's barnet wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 2:56 pm
Interesting piece (from before he resigned) here from Jonathan Wilson, one of the country's finest writers ('Inverting the Pyramid" et al). As a Sunderland fan, he appreciates Allardyce; as a tactically-minded writer, he thinks Sam has been unfairly underestimated.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/bl ... bion-proud
Yeah he gets a lot right. But probably doesn't go far enough. Sam Allardyce for me is way better than many of his more decorated peers. A far better manager than Wenger for example. If you look at input vs output he's light years ahead of what he achieved with the resources available. The London football pseud media of course would never have it but I don't think its really in dispute for me. Getting Bolton to the UEFA cup was a far bigger and better achievement than Wenger spending a fortune at Arsenal for some league titles followed by a decade of decline and failure. There are countless other more fashionable managers from said period far far worse - Moyes, Hodgson, O'Neill, Bruce, Martinez, McClaren, etc the list goes on and on.

He's not helped himself at times with the chip he carries on his shoulder, the unnecessary comments after leaving us etc...(I wonder if he's ever reflected on how he left and perhaps the subsequent events of the club nearly going to the wall after Eddie's spending and reflected he was wrong? I doubt it). But his achievements are played down by people who simply don't understand them.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by TANGODANCER » Thu May 20, 2021 3:12 pm

At a managerial tangent (and not wanting to start another thread), ex Wanderer Matt Taylor has been appointed as head coach at Walsall
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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Mar » Thu May 20, 2021 9:20 pm

BWFC_Insane wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 3:07 pm
Dave Sutton's barnet wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 2:56 pm
Interesting piece (from before he resigned) here from Jonathan Wilson, one of the country's finest writers ('Inverting the Pyramid" et al). As a Sunderland fan, he appreciates Allardyce; as a tactically-minded writer, he thinks Sam has been unfairly underestimated.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/bl ... bion-proud
Yeah he gets a lot right. But probably doesn't go far enough. Sam Allardyce for me is way better than many of his more decorated peers. A far better manager than Wenger for example. If you look at input vs output he's light years ahead of what he achieved with the resources available. The London football pseud media of course would never have it but I don't think its really in dispute for me. Getting Bolton to the UEFA cup was a far bigger and better achievement than Wenger spending a fortune at Arsenal for some league titles followed by a decade of decline and failure. There are countless other more fashionable managers from said period far far worse - Moyes, Hodgson, O'Neill, Bruce, Martinez, McClaren, etc the list goes on and on.

He's not helped himself at times with the chip he carries on his shoulder, the unnecessary comments after leaving us etc...(I wonder if he's ever reflected on how he left and perhaps the subsequent events of the club nearly going to the wall after Eddie's spending and reflected he was wrong? I doubt it). But his achievements are played down by people who simply don't understand them.
I suspect it plays heavily on Allardyce's mind in the manner in which he left. I suspect he would be loathe to admit that he made a mistake leaving Bolton and given his comments it seems like a fair justification but I would imagine that the comments weigh very much in favour of Allardyce and not particularly favourably of Gartside. Surely he could've tried persuading Gartside or E.Davies a little bit more. They might not have shared the same ambition but it sounds like a shame that it couldn't have been better dialog regarding his aspirations. Perhaps he would've had better luck if he would've announced interest from Newcastle.

I do like Allardyce and I like his honesty and his craftiness. I like his football and think its better than the media portrays. It sounds like he has a lot of ties in the midlands and leaving WBA is something that he wouldn't have taken lightly.

I think the biggest shame was the Newcastle take over. It was terrible timing for Allardyce's career and really did cause him a world of problems. Given a decent Newcastle ownership he could've taken them quite far. That being said my lasting memory is him wasting a lot of money at Newcastle at Newcastle (Barton £5m, Alan Smith £6m), I get the impression that we got marquis signings in the likes of Anelka and he never managed to get the time to bring those in at Newcastle.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Harry Genshaw » Thu May 20, 2021 9:32 pm

He's had a long managerial career and can be rightly proud. I'd describe his football as pragmatic. Fine when he was in charge of us but I never enjoyed watching his teams in the days I used to still watch Premier league footy.

He made some awful and costly signings for some of his clubs, Geremi and Smith at Newcastle, Walcott and Tosun at Everton, but in the main he regularly got the best, collectively, out of whoever played for him.

A couple of decent old pics in this article from his time as a player with us.

https://www.inyourarea.co.uk/news/nosta ... O9kAy32ORM
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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Thu May 20, 2021 10:12 pm

Mar wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 9:20 pm
BWFC_Insane wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 3:07 pm
Dave Sutton's barnet wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 2:56 pm
Interesting piece (from before he resigned) here from Jonathan Wilson, one of the country's finest writers ('Inverting the Pyramid" et al). As a Sunderland fan, he appreciates Allardyce; as a tactically-minded writer, he thinks Sam has been unfairly underestimated.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/bl ... bion-proud
Yeah he gets a lot right. But probably doesn't go far enough. Sam Allardyce for me is way better than many of his more decorated peers. A far better manager than Wenger for example. If you look at input vs output he's light years ahead of what he achieved with the resources available. The London football pseud media of course would never have it but I don't think its really in dispute for me. Getting Bolton to the UEFA cup was a far bigger and better achievement than Wenger spending a fortune at Arsenal for some league titles followed by a decade of decline and failure. There are countless other more fashionable managers from said period far far worse - Moyes, Hodgson, O'Neill, Bruce, Martinez, McClaren, etc the list goes on and on.

He's not helped himself at times with the chip he carries on his shoulder, the unnecessary comments after leaving us etc...(I wonder if he's ever reflected on how he left and perhaps the subsequent events of the club nearly going to the wall after Eddie's spending and reflected he was wrong? I doubt it). But his achievements are played down by people who simply don't understand them.
I suspect it plays heavily on Allardyce's mind in the manner in which he left. I suspect he would be loathe to admit that he made a mistake leaving Bolton and given his comments it seems like a fair justification but I would imagine that the comments weigh very much in favour of Allardyce and not particularly favourably of Gartside. Surely he could've tried persuading Gartside or E.Davies a little bit more. They might not have shared the same ambition but it sounds like a shame that it couldn't have been better dialog regarding his aspirations. Perhaps he would've had better luck if he would've announced interest from Newcastle.

I do like Allardyce and I like his honesty and his craftiness. I like his football and think its better than the media portrays. It sounds like he has a lot of ties in the midlands and leaving WBA is something that he wouldn't have taken lightly.

I think the biggest shame was the Newcastle take over. It was terrible timing for Allardyce's career and really did cause him a world of problems. Given a decent Newcastle ownership he could've taken them quite far. That being said my lasting memory is him wasting a lot of money at Newcastle at Newcastle (Barton £5m, Alan Smith £6m), I get the impression that we got marquis signings in the likes of Anelka and he never managed to get the time to bring those in at Newcastle.
I think his departure from Bolton is often unfairly portrayed with future context rather than the situation at the time. When he left he’d (so PG told me once) handed his resignation in the year before only to be persuaded to stay with promise of money from ED and that money was used to sign Anelka.

At the time ED was funding Bolton but wasn’t paying big bucks for new players. Diouf was the biggest cash outlay to that point. The wage bill was high comparatively and of course ED was funding that. But the spending hadn’t started. And you had PG in the middle knowing he needed to keep ED sweet and also knowing his manager was likely to want to leave for somewhere with more resources. So much so two years earlier he’d invested a lot of time trying to get his own manager the England job. Which of course would have presented all with a good way out. It didn’t happen and then Allardyce disappointed and wanting to manage at the top of the game started wanting more to spend.

I mean in hindsight they should have let him go initially and without any sour taste or feelings. But you can see why they tried to keep him.

I don’t in hindsight think Allardyce had much choice. Even with ED’s frantic spending later on the likelihood was we wouldn’t have really competed with the top 4. Perhaps one season but then what? As we’ve found out it was built on sand.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Mar » Fri May 21, 2021 8:51 am

BWFC_Insane wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 10:12 pm
I think his departure from Bolton is often unfairly portrayed with future context rather than the situation at the time. When he left he’d (so PG told me once) handed his resignation in the year before only to be persuaded to stay with promise of money from ED and that money was used to sign Anelka.

At the time ED was funding Bolton but wasn’t paying big bucks for new players. Diouf was the biggest cash outlay to that point. The wage bill was high comparatively and of course ED was funding that. But the spending hadn’t started. And you had PG in the middle knowing he needed to keep ED sweet and also knowing his manager was likely to want to leave for somewhere with more resources. So much so two years earlier he’d invested a lot of time trying to get his own manager the England job. Which of course would have presented all with a good way out. It didn’t happen and then Allardyce disappointed and wanting to manage at the top of the game started wanting more to spend.

I mean in hindsight they should have let him go initially and without any sour taste or feelings. But you can see why they tried to keep him.

I don’t in hindsight think Allardyce had much choice. Even with ED’s frantic spending later on the likelihood was we wouldn’t have really competed with the top 4. Perhaps one season but then what? As we’ve found out it was built on sand.
How sure are we that ED was funding Bolton paying big bucks for new players when Allardyce was there? I thought that was coming out of the TV money. I know this all changed when Allardyce left and I figure ED had to start spending just to address the difference and make us competitive but that wasn't sustainable because we'd seemingly got rid of all the pragmatism, top end scouting, etc. as it wasn't Megson's way (or Lee's way for that matter).

That August transfer window under Lee was one of the worst we've had. Cid, Dzemaili, McCann, Helguson, Braaten and Andy O'Brien came in. Whilst we lost Faye, Ben Haim, Pedersen and Tal. No wonder we felt obliged to splash cash in January. As much as i'm a fan of Steinsson, there's clearly a reason Big Sam didn't take him when he had the opportunity (links to the club via Bergsson) and to splash £3.5m on him was an incredible outlay given we'd been using Hunt, Joey O'Brien and any other stop gap to do that job.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Fri May 21, 2021 9:23 am

Mar wrote:
Fri May 21, 2021 8:51 am
BWFC_Insane wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 10:12 pm
I think his departure from Bolton is often unfairly portrayed with future context rather than the situation at the time. When he left he’d (so PG told me once) handed his resignation in the year before only to be persuaded to stay with promise of money from ED and that money was used to sign Anelka.

At the time ED was funding Bolton but wasn’t paying big bucks for new players. Diouf was the biggest cash outlay to that point. The wage bill was high comparatively and of course ED was funding that. But the spending hadn’t started. And you had PG in the middle knowing he needed to keep ED sweet and also knowing his manager was likely to want to leave for somewhere with more resources. So much so two years earlier he’d invested a lot of time trying to get his own manager the England job. Which of course would have presented all with a good way out. It didn’t happen and then Allardyce disappointed and wanting to manage at the top of the game started wanting more to spend.

I mean in hindsight they should have let him go initially and without any sour taste or feelings. But you can see why they tried to keep him.

I don’t in hindsight think Allardyce had much choice. Even with ED’s frantic spending later on the likelihood was we wouldn’t have really competed with the top 4. Perhaps one season but then what? As we’ve found out it was built on sand.
How sure are we that ED was funding Bolton paying big bucks for new players when Allardyce was there? I thought that was coming out of the TV money. I know this all changed when Allardyce left and I figure ED had to start spending just to address the difference and make us competitive but that wasn't sustainable because we'd seemingly got rid of all the pragmatism, top end scouting, etc. as it wasn't Megson's way (or Lee's way for that matter).

That August transfer window under Lee was one of the worst we've had. Cid, Dzemaili, McCann, Helguson, Braaten and Andy O'Brien came in. Whilst we lost Faye, Ben Haim, Pedersen and Tal. No wonder we felt obliged to splash cash in January. As much as i'm a fan of Steinsson, there's clearly a reason Big Sam didn't take him when he had the opportunity (links to the club via Bergsson) and to splash £3.5m on him was an incredible outlay given we'd been using Hunt, Joey O'Brien and any other stop gap to do that job.
Completely sure. We weren't making profit we were incurring losses. There wasn't a spare £4M for Diouf or £8M for Anelka. At the time ED was essentially funding the running of the club via loans. The wage bill in the premiership was of course wiping out something like 80% of the revenue alone then you have the rest of the staff the day to day operations, etc etc...so ED was sorting it. But things were still relatively cautious. He wasn't throwing round huge transfer fees.

Since promotion in effect we were reliant on ED's loans to stay afloat and the premiership money and future money meant that was (as long as ED was happy) relatively stable. You can chart the huge rise in spending around 2008ish time across the premiership and see it coincide pretty neatly with when ED felt he had to start splurging cash to keep us in the league.

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by Worthy4England » Fri May 21, 2021 1:01 pm

Pretty much correct. Whilst the TV money formed a significant part of our business income, it rarely covered the loss we were making. But there isn't just transfer fees to take into consideration. Whilst we were recruiting out of Contract galacticos, we were likely paying (for us) much higher salaries to attract them here - so I suspect they didn't "cost less" just maybe had a different cashflow profile. It isn't correct to say we didn't pay transfer fees. Our trading costs increased dramatically towards the end of Sam's tenure. 2005 reports we spent £1.5m excluding wages, 2006 calls out Diouf at £4.5m but we did sign other people. 2007 talks about £14.5m and 2008 says a further £20m

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Re: Sam Allardyce

Post by BWFC_Insane » Fri May 21, 2021 1:21 pm

Worthy4England wrote:
Fri May 21, 2021 1:01 pm
Pretty much correct. Whilst the TV money formed a significant part of our business income, it rarely covered the loss we were making. But there isn't just transfer fees to take into consideration. Whilst we were recruiting out of Contract galacticos, we were likely paying (for us) much higher salaries to attract them here - so I suspect they didn't "cost less" just maybe had a different cashflow profile. It isn't correct to say we didn't pay transfer fees. Our trading costs increased dramatically towards the end of Sam's tenure. 2005 reports we spent £1.5m excluding wages, 2006 calls out Diouf at £4.5m but we did sign other people. 2007 talks about £14.5m and 2008 says a further £20m
For the first couple of years we barely had paid a fee. Diouf was the first dealt significant one. Then Anelka. Which was as I was told at least to keep Sam at the club.

After Sam left I believe Little Sammy signed about 10 players for total fees of £5M. Or thereabouts. The spending intention when Sam left was certainly not to keep buying more Anelkas.

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