Sam Allardyce is a creature of contradictions, painted as northern despite coming from the Midlands and so eager to self-aggrandise he makes it more difficult to appreciate him.
Who’s this then?
Samuel Allardyce is the 68-year-old, 6ft 3ins manager of Leeds United, at least for the next four games. Often portrayed as northern by the geographically illiterate, he is obviously from Dudley, which is nowhere near the north.
This is his 13th club managerial job. He managed England for one game before THAT incident meant he resigned/was sacked.
He had a 20-year career as a brutal and uncompromisingly moustachioed defender, in an era when you were rarely allowed to be anything less than brutal, uncompromising and moustachioed as a defender, turning out for 11 different clubs, making 578 appearances and scoring 42 times. Only four of his 20 seasons were spent in the top flight.
His first coaching job was as player-manager of Limerick in the League of Ireland First Division. He won the league with them and moved on to Preston as a caretaker, then came two years at Blackpool between 1994 and 96. Next were two and a half years at Notts County, during which he picked up his second and to date last managerial trophy, winning the Third Division which was, stupidly, actually the fourth tier. He was seen at the time as an up-and-coming young manager and as such was poached by Bolton in October 1999 when they were in the second tier, eventually going up via the play-offs in 2001.
Now in the big league he set about making Bolton play the sort of long ball, aggressive football he played as a defender, but with a bit of imported flair. In the first two Premier League seasons they finished 16th and 13th. There followed the four seasons that have come to define him when the club finished eighth, sixth, eighth and sixth and made the last 32 and last 16 in the UEFA Cup.
In 2004 they reached the League Cup final only to be handed their arse by Middlesbrough. This was all a remarkable achievement for a club of Bolton’s size and he’s understandably traded off this period ever since. Who wouldn’t have?
Portrait of an iconic team: Bolton Wanderers 2003-07
Then it all got a bit smelly. There were periods when he was the boss of Newcastle United, Blackburn, West Ham and Sunderland with win ratios of 33%, 35%, 37% and 29%. Fans of at least two of those four clubs absolutely hated the football he got their teams playing, so much that they actively campaigned to get him…
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