Sam - There's no point being bitter & twisted

Jan 11 2008 by Chloe Griffiths, The Journal

AXED manager Sam Allardyce yesterday admitted his disappointment at leaving Newcastle, but vowed to return to a football hotseat.

The 53-year-old looked despondent as he spoke about his departure from St James’s Park outside his £1.8m rented home in Durham City.

The former Bolton boss became Newcastle’s shortest serving full-time manager after being given the red card after just seven months and 26 days in charge.

Standing on the driveway to his large Victorian house, Allardyce insisted he felt no bitterness towards the club.

He said: “For me, it’s the future now, and obviously to take a break with my wife and go away. With a little bit of recharging my batteries, I’ll come back and carry on with my football career.

“I think that me and my wife will get away to the sunshine and have a little break, come back refreshed and obviously stay in football.

“When that will come, who knows? We will have to wait and see.”

Since Allardyce’s departure, rumour has been rife over who will be his replacement. While Magpies legend and former captain Alan Shearer was immediately the fans’ choice, Portsmouth manager Harry Redknapp leapt in as the bookmakers’ favourite.

Allardyce said he had been in contact with Redknapp, but refused to speculate on who would be next to take the top job at the club.

He said: “I’m not speculating on who or what will be taking over. I have no bitterness towards the club. There is no point being bitter and twisted at all because that would only affect you. For me, it’s disappointing and you have to move on with your life.” After just 24 games in charge, and with eight wins under his belt, Allardyce admitted he did not know the reason for the timing of the sacking.

Amid frenzied speculation yesterday as to who will fill the vacant position, Portsmouth signalled their intention of hanging on to Redknapp. The former West Ham boss insisted he had not been approached by officials at Newcastle and was happy on the south coast.

Friends of Shearer also distanced him from the rumours, saying he wished to continue his work as a BBC pundit. Blackburn’s Mark Hughes also found himself thrust into the field, while former Tottenham Hotspurs man Martin Jol is said to be in the running.

Bosses at Newcastle have given little indication of who they are targeting to fill the vacant position, but it is clear whoever becomes the club’s eighth manager in the space of 11 years will be expected to produce the kind of football served up during the eras of Kevin Keegan and Sir Bobby Robson.

It is understood Allardyce’s reign came to an end over a confrontation over strengthening the squad in the January transfer window, as well as Allardyce’s style of football.

In the wake of Allardyce’s dismissal, his former assistant Phil Brown insisted his close friend would soon bounce back.

The Hull City boss said: “He’ll want to prove everyone at Newcastle wrong by coming back and managing at the top level again. The Newcastle job was a big challenge for the man, and given time he would have cracked it, but that’s history now.”

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‘Actually, misguided is not the word for it. It borders on lunacy’

MAGPIES supporters met the news of Sam Allardyce’s departure with a mixed response yesterday – some eager to see him given more time, others happy chairman Mike Ashley had shown him the red card.

But high-profile writers took the former Bolton man’s departure as an opportunity to mock the club.

Football critic Frank Malley, who branded Allardyce’s leaving as “senseless”, wrote: “So the madness continues.

“After just 239 days and 24 games, Sam Allardyce departs Newcastle and the most misguided football club in Britain once again searches for a new manager. Actually misguided is not the word for it. It is worse than that. It borders on lunacy.”

He pointed to the sacking of Sir Bobby Robson after five years in which he saved them from the ignominy of relegation and took them to a Champions League spot as further evidence.

Mr Malley added: “Allardyce needed time. Anyone who sips from the Tyneside chalice needs time because it is a club with a passionate following, but one which labours under the delusion that somehow, even though it has not won a domestic trophy since 1955, it has a right to compete with the real Premier League giants of Manchester United, Arsenal and Liverpool.”

Daily Express writer Niall Hickman wrote: “Without a domestic trophy since 1955, the Magpies have long been viewed as the club, above all, with ideas way over its station.”

Paul Hayward, chief sports writer on the Daily Mail, wrote: “Allardyce’s sacking is not a shock. This is the Newcastle way. Hang out the bunting for the new guy, give him bundles of money to spend and then raise the noose above the Gallowgate End before he has chance to impose his own philosophy.”

Middlesbrough boss Gareth Southgate described the managerial merry-go-round as “nuts”.