England manager, Sam Allardyce, has been caught by undercover reporters from The Telegraph citing third-party ownerships ‘weren't a problem', agreeing to a deal that conflicts with his contract with the FA and mocking former manager Roy Hodgson and assistant manager Gary Neville.
The Telegraph set up an investigation team whose sole purpose was to unravel and expose various levels of corruption with the English footballing framework and their discoveries went all the way up to the English manager.
Corruption in English football isn’t a new thing. It’s been rampant since the late 1940s and as much as people believe it’s dying down, it continues to fester silently in the underbellies of various top flight teams, their managers, agents and more.
In the multiple videos The Telegraph released, - thanks to repeated meetings with the former Bolton, Blackburn, West Ham and Sunderland manager - Allardyce was thought to have been meeting a Far East company - fictitious of course - to discuss the possibility of being a sort of mentor that helps the ‘businessmen' navigate around the third-party ownership rules the FA have imposed.
The English FA and the French FFF both banned the practice of third-party ownerships in the country especially after West Ham United brought in Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano to the club from Brazilian side Corinthians - which was later exposed to have only been possible because of said ownership rights certain individuals had invested in.
The practice has since reduced but remains ‘hidden' in many players’ contracts thanks to thrifty work by certain footballing agents.
Allardyce acknowledged all of the above and even revealed that he was able to sign Enner Valencia to West Ham even though the player was partly owned by third party organisations.
The English manager was reportedly close to agreeing a deal with the company to earn around £400,000-a-year just to ensure that the interested parties were able to buy stakes in players’ economic rights.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
‘Woy'
“He’d send them all to sleep, Roy. Woy. He hasn’t got the personality for it,” said Allardyce when asked if the former England manager could be a good public speaker.
Roy Hodgson won ten of his UEFA European Championships qualifiers but failed to make it to the last few rounds of the finals and Allardyce believes Hodgson couldn’t handle it and just ‘collapsed’.
“Players let him down in the end. I think maybe he, he was too indecisive. Cast a bit of an anxiety over to the players maybe. I mean prior to the Iceland game, he won all 10 qualifiers.
“We'd drawn with Russia, we should have won. We beat Wales, and that was our worst performance. We drew with Slovakia, and we only had to draw with Iceland to get through ... he just collapsed.”
“They were arguing for 10 minutes about bringing him (Marcus Rashford) on, him and Gary Neville.
"So Gary was the wrong influence for him. f***ing tell Gary to sit down and shut up, so you can do what you want. You’re the manager, you do what you want, not what they anyone else”
‘Prince Harry’s a naughty boy’
With Wembley having secured the finals of the UEFA European Championship in 2020, Sam Allardyce wasn’t happy that the Duke of Cambridge didn’t make it to the launch of the event, something that was expected of him given his role with the FA.
“The only one that never turned up was Prince William,” said Allardyce.
"He’s our ambassador for the Football Association, so it would have been nice if he’d have turned up but he obviously had more, much busier things on.”
And when asked on his opinion of Prince Harry - with the exact question unclear at this point - Allardyce wasn’t very subtle.
"Harry’s a naughty boy. He’s a very naughty boy, very naughty. He shows his bottom and all sorts.”
Open discussion
Allardyce was seen criticising the FA for redeveloping the Wembley stadium pointing out to the fact that they were going to spend the foreseeable future trying to pay back their debt having spent nearly £870 million on the reconstruction.
And later accused the FA of being a profit-making machine by churning out around £325 million a year in revenue.
He also revealed how many senior English players were involved in gambling activities with cards and other forms of gambling paraphernalia being used on a regular basis but admitted that it wasn’t as intense as it used to be.
Allardyce was appointed the manager of the English national side - being paid £3 million a year for two years - on 22nd July earlier this year. He even won his first - and possibly final - game in charge when Adam Lallana scored the winner deep into the second half against Slovakia.
The FA are yet to release a statement on this issue.
