“I was always a centre-half and a dirty bastard at that.”
And, lo, Sam Allardyce introduces himself early in his autobiography Big Sam. No frills.
Allardyce was describing the 14-year-old version of himself, a tough lad from a Dudley estate in England’s west Midlands, former industrial revolution territory, Wolves country.
Allardyce trained with the Wolves and West Brom. He had a trial with Aston Villa. But the club the dirty bastard 14-year-old impressed most was not one of those on the doorstep, it was Bolton Wanderers.
A Bolton scout asked for Allardyce's number after a county match between Staffordshire and Cheshire. It was 1968, the Allardyces had no phone.
Allardyce gave his address instead. Bolton were not put off. They knocked on the door and Allardyce was on his way north. Nat Lofthouse, Lion of Vienna, was Bolton manager at the time. It was a dream; it was reality.
The young apprentice would, with the others, sweep Burnden Park’s terraces every Monday morning.
“Bolton were getting 15-20,000 crowds even in the Second Division,” Allardyce writes, “so there was plenty of scope for discovering loose change.”
There are various strands that run through Allardyce's book and one is money – the lack of it and the pursuit of it. When Ian Greaves became Bolton manager and Allardyce had made the first team, Greaves offered his bruising defender £50 if he could burst the ball in a tackle. "I tried and tried," Allardyce says.
And now, nudging half a century on from his first visit, Allardyce returns to Bolton. Back then he settled in Settle Street, with a landlady, and was given expenses to catch the bus to training; today he returns as the multi-millionaire former England manager in charge of Premier League Crystal Palace.
Two spells
There were two spells as a Bolton player over 10 years, more than 200 appearances. A big centre-half, a big dirty bastard.
Then came eight years as manager. Allardyce transformed the club and half-altered his reputation. Bolton were physical and blunt. Like the man himself. But there was subtlety and intelligence too – Okocha, Hierro, Speed. There were the analytics. There was European football. Some frills.
Bolton Wanderers became Sam Allardyce and vice versa.
Could Palace and he ever kindle such a relationship? We just don’t know. At 62 time suggests otherwise; then again, 62 isn’t the old age it was.
Perhaps more pertinent is that there have been three Palace games so far and already there is tension. During Tuesday night's deflating home defeat by Swansea, the local paper, the Croydon Advertiser, reported that fans disillusioned by the decline under Alan Pardew were "openly jeering and ironically cheering". At the end, as hostile boos rang around Selhurst Park, there was a banner: "Corruption Not Welcome".
It was hardly a handshake and a pat on the back at what was Allardyce’s home debut.
He knows what it’s like to be unwelcome – at Newcastle some called him Big Sham and at West Ham the reservations were almost constant.
At Blackburn Rovers and Sunderland they might have Allardyce back quickly, but it is at Bolton where he would feel at home.
Or so you would think. Then you remember the Panorama allegations, the unanswered questions, then the spring 2007 departure, Allardyce resigning before the end of the season. At the last home game he was not allowed into the dressing-room by chairman Phil Gartside.
Then you remember that, having left for Newcastle, his first game as their manager was Bolton away. Gartside said Allardyce’s family could not sit in the directors’ box for their own safety. It was a line Allardyce didn’t believe.
“I’d never wanted to win a match more than that one,” Allardyce said. Newcastle won 3-1. “I was ecstatic, especially as I’d been booed by some of the crowd.”
Dismissed
He also went back as Blackburn manager. That ended less well – a 2-1 defeat in December 2010. Allardyce was dismissed by Blackburn’s new owners – the Venkys – the next day.
So Bolton holds various meanings to Allardyce.
And he means various things to Bolton Wanderers. He presided over the club's rise to the Premier League and Europe, but that required investment as well as nous. Ultimately Bolton ran out of money and by the time Neil Lennon arrived, the club was sinking. This time last year Lennon had to organise "a whip round" for unpaid staff.
There has been a takeover since, but Bolton are still looking around for that loose change on the Burnden terraces. The new chairman, Ken Anderson, says he has put in "additional funding" to cover December's costs.
Otherwise December was good. Bolton won four of five games and sit second in “League One” – the inaccurately named third division.
December 2016 was also good for Sam Allardyce. He came back. But January 2017 has started less promisingly and the fans travelling from south London to Lancashire should reflect on Allardyce’s previous readiness to get out of cup competitions to shore up league form.
Even before Bolton he has mentioned next Saturday – West Ham away, another homecoming of sorts. Make no mistake, Allardyce would rather finish 17th in the league and lose at Bolton, than finish 18th and get to the next round of the FA Cup.
So although there was a lack of anticipation when the third round draw was made, that was December 5th, that was before Big Sam was going back to Bolton on a good, old-fashioned Saturday afternoon ripe for an upset. Just like the old days.
Managerial merry-go-round adds intrigue to anti-climax
On the subject of the third round draw’s anti-climax: Hull City versus Swansea City.
One month on, though, this is an occasion of intrigue. So fast does Premier League football spin that the two managers on December 5th – Mike Phelan and Bob Bradley – have been over-turned.
Paul Clement has arrived at Swansea from Bayern Munich, and Marco Silva, late of Olympiakos, has landed in Hull – UK City of Culture 2017.
Phelan was 54, Silva is 39; Bradley was 58, Clement is 44. Experience did not win the day.
Hull and Swansea have troubles. Both clubs have new-ish owners and both have alienated chunks of their fanbase. Both managers will seek to make signings in January.
Silva’s situation is the more acute. Hull are technically three points off safety, but it’s four with goal difference and he has a League Cup semi-final first leg with Manchester United next Tuesday. He might not see the magic of the FA Cup.
In Portugal Silva is known as the next José Mourinho. They meet three times in three weeks. Boa sorte!
