Allardyce who has just four games to save Leeds United from relegation insisted no manager is “ahead of him in football terms”
By Kehinde Okeowo
Manchester City boss, Pep Guardiola has said English tactician, Sam Allardyce aka Big Sam is “right” about his claims that he is a much better coach than he is being envisaged.
Allardyce had insisted top Premier League managers such as Jurgen Club, Mikel Arteta and Guardiola are not ahead of him in football terms, while being unveiled on Wednesday, as Leeds United’s new manager.
Big Sam who was drafted in as Javi Gracia’s replacement until the end of the season, has just four games to save the Yorkshire club from relegation and his first game will be against Guardiola.
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During the unveiling, Allardyce said: “I may be 68 and look old but there’s nobody ahead of me in football terms, not Pep (Guardiola), not (Jurgen) Klopp, not (Mikel) Arteta, so it’s all there with me,”
Responding to the veteran manager’s claims, Guardiola after his team trashed visiting West Ham 3-0 at the Etihad Stadium said: “He is right, I want to be honest. Now look what happened with, for example, Neil Warnock in Huddersfield. It looks like now the young managers are there with the tactics or whatever, so they are really good, they help us to be what we are.
“Look at the managers, Roy Hodgson for Crystal Palace, what they have done. They are really good, they have incredible experience, they know the game perfectly and if he feels that, it is because of this. He [Allardyce] has the charisma, he will put out the pressure to the players and he knows exactly what to do in this kind of situation in a relegation battle.
“It looks like this type of old managers… I’m honest, so what they have done for the club [is dismissed as] ‘they are old, whatever’. Now the people who are 35, 40, 45, we invent football or we create football? No, football is already created and these guys belong to that league and helped us to do it and that’s why.”