Cracks appearing between Gold and Allardyce - Wait until Sullivan joins in!

So Gold has contradicted Allardyce's claim that he will be sacked come the end of the season if we don't get promoted. That may sound like a vote of confidence but it sounds more like a back hand swipe to me, with Gold saying he had no idea where the notion had come from - before suggesting it might be the tea lady. It's good to know the char woman is such a good judge at least!

Sullivan has been strangely reticent this season, apart from his "In bed with Dale" session. The pressure to speak out must be building, however, and it is difficult to imagine him keeping his gob shut for too much longer. The owners have backed Allardyce right down the line so far - treatment not extended to Zola and Grant of course - but with boos greeting the final whistle again last night, they must be beginning to wonder about the wisdom of appointing Allardyce to manage the Academy of Football.

As long as things were going well, a percentage of the natives were prepared to accept him - but they would sell their own sisters to Syrian pimps if the price was right! However, with the tide turning and the team struggling, even the pragmatists are having their doubts and are increasingly aligning themselves with the purists. The crassly one dimensional football and obscene percentage game that Allardyce favours has never won him any friends; now it is not winning him many points either.

They won't sack Allardyce of course. That would cost too much. Instead they will sit on their hands and hope upon hope that we somehow stumble over the finishing line in second place. But if we don't get up, they will make it bloody uncomfortable for him to stay. And Big Sam's bigger ego may see him flounce out. It's demeaning enough to be managing a bunch of southern softies in the Championship when, by rights, he should be in the charge of Real Madrid or England, how unbearable would it be to be managing those southern softies with the owners questioning his decisions and tactics?

Who next? Well if Di Canio were to be anointed new manager, the fans would fund and build a statue of Gold and Sullivan outside the Olympic Stadium; and as much as I hate his politics, even I would welcome Il Canio back to Upton Park. We might not win any more games, but at least we would fail with swagger and style!