Sam Allardyce is confident of leading West Ham back into the Premier League. Photograph: David LeveneSam Allardyce bows his head, closes his eyes and rubs his forehead for a good 10 seconds. The memory alone is headache-inducing. "I was a raging bull, an angry man, worrying, demanding," he says, as he reflects on his evolution as a football manager.
Arsene Wenger or Rafael Benitez might like to add to the description, but Allardyce is not talking about the halcyon days at Bolton Wanderers, when he would routinely upset the establishment, rather his formative years at Limerick, Blackpool and Notts County.
"My style now compared to back then, it was just a part of the process," he says. "I don't think you can do it any other way, because you are too inexperienced to do it any other way. But if you don't learn from your experiences, then you don't last in this game."
Allardyce has lasted. He once said that he would like to see through his 10-year contract at Bolton and retire at 56. "By the time that birthday comes along, I would think I would be looking at other things in my life." Allardyce will turn 57 in October. At the start of last month, he signed a two-year deal at West Ham United.
He is consumed and driven by the challenge in front of him – to restore the club's morale, which was battered during their relegation from the Premier League, and to lift them to an immediate return. It will not be easy, and not only because this season's Championship contains plenty of intriguing contenders.
West Ham have parted company with 12 senior players from last season's squad and the number could yet swell. Scott Parker is keen to remain in the Premier League and will be sold if his valuation is met. "Scott's position is delicate," Allardyce says, "because if someone hits the numbers that we would value him at and it's the Premier League, where he wants to be, he will be gone."
Allardyce has named Kevin Nolan, the ?4m signing from Newcastle United, as club captain, rather than Parker, although it ought to be noted that Parker was not the captain last season. Matthew Upson, who was released on the expiry of his contract, had the armband.
"The misconception that Scott was captain was born out of the rousing half-time speech that he gave at West Brom [in February]," Allardyce says of the midfielder's address that inspired the team from 3-0 down to 3-3. "I'd like to hear the transcript of that. I might use it myself.
"It would be wrong of me to plan [with Parker]. Kevin is here because he thinks his future lies here and he wants to get us back in the Premier League. Like me, he doesn't want to drop out of the Premier League for more than one season."
Allardyce admits he has hung himself "out to dry" by pledging to seek an instant return. He also accepts that the need to gain promotion is intensified by the club's financial position. West Ham carry debts of ?80m and David Sullivan, the co-owner, has said that life in the Championship will "blow a ?40m hole" in the business plan. Then there is the move to the Olympic Stadium in 2014 and the imperative to take Premier League football with them.
Allardyce, though, radiates optimism. Along with Nolan, he has added Matthew Taylor for ?2.2m from Bolton and the free transfers Joey O'Brien, also from Bolton, and Abdoulaye Faye from Stoke City. Further signings are afoot, with the priorities being a left-back and a striker. The England internationals Robert Green and Carlton Cole appear more likely to stay than go.
"We want to go up automatically," Allardyce says. "And if we don't quite achieve that goal, then we are going to be left in the play-offs, at the very least, unless I become the worst manager ever overnight and the players become the worst there has ever been."
Allardyce's style these days is characterised by a thick-skinned self-belief and searing ambition. Where once he would lie awake at night "frightened by what the fans or the papers or the owners would say", he now feels able to blot out the background noise, which is perhaps just as well at a noisy club like West Ham.
"I used to be a terrible, terrible worrier, a pessimist," he says. "It's probably because I was a defender. One mistake and the manager will shout at you. I couldn't remember playing well. I could only remember mistakes. I used to worry like mad. But as I got older and established myself, that diminished and as a manager, it's the same."
Insecurity has given way to conviction. Spectacularly so. Despite his sackings at Newcastle and, more recently, Blackburn Rovers when, in both cases, the ownership changed and his face no longer fitted, he can be fiercely proud of his cv. With man-management his greatest strength he maintains that he could win trophies at the very biggest clubs, such as Real Madrid and Internazionale, if he was given the opportunity.
"I've said a lot of things over the years that people laugh at and I find them very insulting for making a joke about it or laughing at how I could be a manager of any club, anywhere and deal with it. I still feel like I can walk into any club, anywhere, any time and deliver. It's a bit like a CEO, isn't it? You can take up a position in any industry and if you're a good CEO, you can make that company profitable. You put me in a football environment anywhere in the world and I can deliver the module. I can modify the module for the particular culture and the way of playing."
It remains easy to touch a nerve with Allardyce. Just tell him his teams have been long-ball bully boys or that he jars with the "West Ham way". "People had to make an excuse, at the time, for little old Bolton beating Chelsea, Arsenal and Man United," he says. "Little old Bolton used to beat Rafa Benitez [and Liverpool] every time he came to the Reebok Stadium. And they couldn't cope with it."
Allardyce's West Ham will look to entertain but, above all, to win. He made the point that Manchester United and Chelsea were not only the best creative teams but the most destructive ones, too. "There is an adaptability," he says. "They never play the same way. Arsenal probably do and that's probably why they've won nothing for six years."
The country's elite will have to wait. Allardyce must first ensure that the step down a division serves as a springboard. But he has it mapped out and the goal is to challenge for European places and cup finals. "How far can we go? That depends on how much the owners want to back the dream to turn it into reality," he says. "That's what I've done and that's what I do. I turn dreams into reality."
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