Toon too small for Big Sam

Former Magpies boss reveals disappointment

By Lewis Rutledge   Last updated: 10th February 2008   Subscribe to RSS Feed

Toon too small for Big Sam

Allardyce: Won't accept blame

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Sam Allardyce has rubbished suggestions that the Newcastle job was too big for him and claimed the reverse was probably true.

Allardyce parted company with The Magpies in January after just eight months at the helm.

Newcastle had struggled to get above mid-table in the first half of the season but Allardyce does not believe he deserved to be sacked.

"When you get sacked, reflection is a difficult scenario. The one thing you have to evaluate first and foremost is how much of it was your fault," he told The People.

"I think you can accept it a lot more if you can come to terms with the fact that a good percentage of it was your fault - but that doesn't apply to me at Newcastle."

Rubbish

Allardyce was determined to restore success to Newcastle over the coming years but he admits that when he took the job it was not all he had hoped for.

He fumed: "The usual rubbish that goes when someone like me is sacked from a club like Newcastle is that the job was too big for me. That's just not true.

"If I'm honest the reverse is probably true. Newcastle probably wasn't big enough for me - it didn't live up to my ambitions in the short time that I was there. And because it didn't do that the club missed a chance to realise its own ambitions.

"The more I analyse it, the more I come to the conclusion that it was never about me or results.

"It was about things they wanted to put in place."