Sam Allardyce maintains he is a changed man and, by way of proving it, has even reached a rapprochement with Arsène Wenger.
The Sunderland manager’s long-running, well-documented feud with his Arsenal counterpart was inspired largely by attempted gamesmanship but Allardyce is adamant he no longer deploys such tactics – and is not convinced they ever worked.
As the Wearsiders prepared for Saturday’s trip to the Emirates he reflected on a spiky rivalry that originated when his Bolton team began picking up points against Arsenal.
In a recently published autobiography Allardyce detailed precisely how much he enjoyed winding up Wenger and described the Frenchman as having “an air of arrogance”. Their relationship is now “amicable” but Allardyce makes no apologies for the references to Arsenal’s manager in his memoir.
“He’s probably not bought the book,” said Sunderland’s manager. “Whether it riles him or not, it was about my life in the early years. My life’s not like that now. The last time I wound a rival manager up was Rafa [Benítez] when I was at Blackburn. I’m completely different now.
“I had some good fun with Arsène in the early years. I got under his skin. Our meetings have been much more amicable since, on and off the field. I’ve always had a huge amount of respect for him. Winding up was just a procedure we used a long time ago but I’m not sure it makes a difference to players on the field.”
Even so, he accepts the autobiography could be the elephant in the room on Saturday. “I’ve had some good conversations with Arsène recently, especially about developing young players and getting them into the Premier League but I’m not going to mention the book unless he does,” he said. “If I have a drink with Arsène I want to talk about whether he has any players he might lend me in January.”
At Bolton and Blackburn Allardyce’s teams were no stranger to gamesmanship on the pitch but he is adamant those days are gone. “I don’t particularly like controversy,” he said. “Discipline is a massive part of being successful in football. Self-discipline as an individual and as a team. You’ve got to keep your ‘inner chimp’ quiet.”
He concedes his old, much brasher persona was partly a facade. “With experience you learn more about the game,” said Allardyce. “You prioritise much better, you’re calmer and you learn to handle things. In the early days you can be overcome by the pressures of being in the Premier League, you react to what people say but, as you get older and wiser, you let things go.”
