Sam Sets The Standard

How depressing was Allardyce's article in the Evening Standard? No hint of an apology for our awful performance against Forest. Instead, he serves up a dish of smug, self congratulatory triumphalism, with a garnish of caution in case it all goes wrong.

Doctor Evil's understanding of the game is summed up when he boasts that stats show how we have got the ball into the opposition box more often than any other team in the division. That, according to Sam, is the mark of a good team!

To hell with the quality of the delivery! Never mind that there's nobody in the box to receive it! So what that 95% of the time the ball finds a defender with time and space to clear? It's statistics my friend, and even if you only find your own player 5% of the time, 5% of one hundred is better than 5% of fifty, so hoof the ball in as often as possible and eventually you will find a player from your own team!

It is the diametrically opposite approach of Barcelona. Watch the Catalans play and they treat the penalty area like the vagina of a goddess, only to be penetrated in moments of divine ecstasy. The ball is loved. A pass across the face of the box is foreplay. A pass backwards is titillation. A pass wide is a touch against the erogenous zones.

But Allardyce isn't interested in foreplay. Fcuk it. Get it in there. Knock her to the floor, rip off her underwear and give her one, then chalk it up on the bed post, burp, fart and chew on a pack of Wrigley's is his approach. And for those of us who have worshipped at the altar of Moore, Hurst, Peters, Brooking, Di Canio, Greenwood and Lyall, it is the ultimate desecration, the ultimate corruption of a thing of beauty.

But we are top of the table the Allardyce apostates will argue, like fathers who ignore the bruises on their daughter's arms because the boyfriend is a good lad who always buys his round. God help us!