If you are a Bolton supporter, the following quotes are not what you want to hear when your near-legendary boss is linked with another club,
“If Stuart Pearce was to leave and Manchester City were to make an official approach, who knows?” Allardyce told Zoo magazine.
“I see I’ve been linked with the job, but I take all that with a pinch of a salt.
“The only time I really believe anyone wants me is when my chairman rings to say a club has asked for permission to speak to me.
“But I don’t like speculating when someone else is still in a job. It’s personal and it’s unprofessional, but it’s a fact of life these days.
“Someone will be linked to my job when we next go through a rough spell. It comes to us all.”
Zoo gets all the best interviews, but while Allardyce is trying to come off all “Who knows?” it does seem like Manchester City could quite easily get him in for a chat if Stuart Pearce “was to leave”, before saying he doesn’t like speculating about someone else’s job – even though he just did it.
The initial failure of the Alan Curbishley reign at West Ham thus far has made us even more wary of managers who have done a great job at a club, but only after being there for hundreds of years. It adds weight to the argument that manager’s need time to get things right, but you have to question their ability to do it again at a club where they haven’t built everything from the ground up.
Still, seeing managers like Curbs and Fat Sam move onto ‘bigger’ clubs is part of what makes the Premiership exciting – and David Moyes sheds a tear of joy.