Sam slams unreasonable demands

  • by Staff Writer
  • Sunday, 21st December 2014

Sam Allardyce has hit out at supporters' unrealistic demands almost a year to the day since he faced calls for his dismissal.

This time last year Allardyce was fighting to stay in his job after a large minority of Hammers fans called for his instant dismissal, following a run of poor results (exacerbated by a crippling injury situation).

Those same fans have been proved wrong on almost every count since and the days of seeing banners proclaiming 'Fat Sam Out!' are long gone. However the situation has clearly left a sour taste in Big Sam's mouth, as he spoke out to condemn the demand for instant gratification which is prevalant amongst modern day soccer fans.

"It was a period where we had to try and scrape through and get to the other end," Allardyce told Goal on Sunday's Ben Shepherd and Chris Kamara. "We also got to the semi final of the Capital One Cup but the players got no credit for that at all. It didn't matter what we did, the players were getting criticised.

"The players felt it didn't matter what they did or how they went about their job, so we just stuck together really.

"Fans can't keep asking football clubs to be instantly successful overnight and keep signing seven, eight, nine players every year. That seems to be the norm now. We've done well by settling them in, but how many managers have lost their job by doing that?

"Paolo Di Canio at Sunderland, he bought 11 in and they didn't gel. Tottenham, they didn't gel and Liverpool haven't gelled so everyone's asking what's going on.

"Bringing so many new players into a football club [at once] means a mammoth task to get the best of out them instantly but everybody expects that - and that's why impatience stops growth at football clubs.

"It stops development and ultimately it stops managers doing a good job at a football club because there's too many sackings. Not in the Premier League this year but everywhere else they're getting fired left, right and centre. There's such a lack of stability there that stops sustainable success."

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