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West Ham’s next manager

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Harry RedknappAs West Ham fans, we have to accept that the debate on Sam Allardyce will continue to divide opinion amongst us for the duration of his tenure at the club. Whilst we all have our opinions (myself included!) on his style of football, team selection, man management and youth policy, we have to accept the reality that Sam will be with us for the foreseeable future as the chairmen look to build on the stability that he has provided in the past two seasons.

That being said, I decided to take a look at the odds for the ‘Next Permanent West Ham Manager’ – out of pure interest, to see who the bookies had as the favourite to succeed Sam when he eventually leaves the club. The only two bookmakers I have found to be offering odds on this market are Stan James and Bet Victor, and whilst their odds are pretty much the same, for the purposes of this article I have taken the odds given on Stan James. The results, in my opinion, were very surprising.

Harry Redknapp – 7/4

Personally, I’m a little surprised to see Harry as such a clear favourite. Ever since he left Tottenham Hotspur, he’s been tenuously linked with a return to West Ham, however there has never been even the slightest indication from either party that it was ever anything more than paper talk. Harry seems happy enough at QPR, where the chairman is showing a lot of faith in him as he continues on his summer clear out mission. Many also see this as Redknapp’s last big pay packet as he edges ever closer to retirement. With Allardyce under contract until 2015, Harry may already be sunning himself on a south coast golf course by the time the job becomes available.

Paolo Di Canio – 8/1

A huge fans favourite, Paolo is one of a few select players in this club’s great history that can be classed as a legend. Passionate, fiery and frighteningly determined, he has earned himself a reputation of being somewhat of a taskmaster in his short career in management, through infamous fall-outs with players and heavy fines for breaches of club discipline. When he left Swindon Town and Allardyce’s contract was running down, there were calls from many fans for his homecoming. As we know, it never happened, and Paolo is in the middle of his continental revolution on Wearside. I truly believe that one day the Italian maverick will be patrolling the touchline at Upton Park (or most probably the OS) – but perhaps not so soon that he is the next manager.

Alan Curbishley25/1

Although odds of 25/1 don’t reflect any kind of confidence in Alan Curbishley returning as manager, he is still, surprisingly, third favourite with the bookmakers. Bar the occasional TV appearance with Sky Sports, Curbs has been unemployed since resigning from us in 2008 for ‘a lack of control over transfer policy.’ While the ownership structure has radically changed since then, something tells me that his best days as a manager are behind him and won’t be making a return any time soon.

After Curbishley, there are a whole host of names listed at 33/1. These include Roberto Martinez, Roy Keane, Alex Mcleish, Rafa Benitez and Iain Dowie, previous managers including Glenn Roeder and Avram Grant (please no!) and even the sadistic inclusion of Paul Ince. More realistic names featured at this price include Slaven Bilic, Chris Hughton, Stuart Pearce and Gus Poyet. For an outside bet, current Birmingham manager Lee Clark is available at 66/1. He’s currently nurturing a squad of young talent on one of the tightest budgets in the championship, and may well have grown enough as a manager to be in with a chance in the next few years. Combine that with the two David’s links to Birmingham, and Clark may be worth a punt.

In reality, whilst there may be some value in picking one of the names at a higher price, the market is completely wide open and there is no way of predicting the sequence of events that would lead to a new manager being installed. If I had to put my money on one of them, I’d stick £100 on Roeder, so at least I would have something to smile about if he wormed his way back into the dugout.

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34 comments

  • jeff says:

    What nonsense. Sam is the best thing for us for thirty years, and will be our manager until his retirement.

  • bubbles says:

    What a total waste of time . You are clueless and insulting my ( limited ) intelligence .

    Not only that you forgot the Worm at Orient …… Sorry Hearn … It is the only way he could get to the Olympic Stadium .

  • Irons says:

    Sam Allardyce is a far better manager then any on that list and i think BS could well retire with us before Paolo Di Canio hopefully takes over when he has more years experience and is generally a bbetter manager.

  • ed says:

    Im telling you now, wether you like him or not, Sam Allardyce is 100% not going anywhere any time soon. The only way sam is going to leave is if another club persuades him to leave. Sullivan and Gold wouldnt have the guts to sack him unless something had gone really wrong. All the club need, and what the owners want is stability. Your not getting that chopping and changing managers every 10 minutes. I love Di Canio to bits but he is an absolute nutcase, and needs a good few years in the prem before he turns up at west ham. I like Harry but eventually England will come calling and he will be gone in a flash. If sam leaves we will be back in the championship in no time.

  • Steve says:

    Harry will never get the England job, and I for one wouldn’t have him back at west ham, SAMs doing a job for us at the present time, But if he did decide to go I would love too see Slaven Bilic take over

  • Chris says:

    Personally I feel this hugely disrespectful to Sam, he was exactly what we needed. When you consider what he achieved at Bolton and then weigh up what finances he had to work when he was there he’s been pretty consistent. We all want the “West Ham” way of playing football but until we can put out a side of at least 8 players that cost between 15 to 20 million a piece it’s not gonna happen. And another point which has been repeated numerous times, we don’t play a long ball game, sam isn’t about the long ball, je is about the right and if the right ball is to hit Carroll quick and build then s obe it.

    COYI

  • Peter says:

    If this is the best this site come up with ,do us all a favour. Take up origami, stop wasting your time running a blog.Sam’s doing a brilliant job and you should be ashamed of yourself running this before the season starts.

  • Aussie Peter says:

    I wouldn’t be surprised to see Big Sam spend a long time as manager and would be pleased to see it.We are clearly making advances off the field. When you look carefully at the OS deal its extraordinary. The Gunners have been paying off The Emirates for years but in commercial terms we’ve virtually been given a world class stadium. I can’t see the owners changing managers (and introducing instability) unless they have to…and they don’t. And in the context of the owners trying to lead us into a new era they are not,I’m certain,going to gamble on Di Canio. Fantastic player as well all know but “passion” doesn’t get you through 38 league games as a manager.

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