Fresh from controversial defeat at Old Trafford, Blackburn Rovers manager Sam Allardyce has more than one bone to pick with the various officials who run the game.

 

The Ewood boss’s fury at Howard Webbs’s failure to punish World Footballer of the Year Cristiano Ronaldo for aiming a kick at David Dunn and missing what Rovers believe was a blatant penalty when Morten Gamst Pedersen was hauled back in the area is match only by his abject dislike of the ‘political’ way in which he was overlooked for the England manager’s position in 2006. 

He was one of the favourites to get the position before Steve McClaren’s ill-fated appointment as Sven Goren Eriksson’s successor and it still riles Allardyce more that two year later. “I should have got it and I really don't know why I didn't. It had to be political for me, rather than my credentials“ said Allardyce.

On McClaren’s sacking, the Rovers boss did not even receive a mention as another foreign manager was sought given the former Middlesbrough chief’s dire showing. Sam bemoaned "I am probably even better equipped to do the job now but would never get a mention".