Some big, big football news breaking tonight: a special Telegraph investigation has filmed new England manager Sam Allardyce negotiating a £400,000 deal and offering businessmen advice on how to "get around" rules pertaining to player transfers.
Allardyce met with men whom he believed to be businessmen from the Far East before he was unveiled as England's manager, but in reality they were undercover reporters for the Telegraph.
The men told Allardyce they were hoping to make a profit on the Premier League transfer market, and Allardyce responded by advising them how to get around rules relating to the third-party ownership of players. Third-party ownership of footballers is outlawed by Fifa and the FA, the latter his new employers. He advised them to approach certain agents.
Allardyce was also filmed negotiating a £400,000 arrangement, which would involve meeting a firm interested in third-party ownership.
Allardyce then held a second meeting with the men, where he discussed England and their performance at Euro 2016. He criticised Roy Hodgson, harshly, saying that he wasn't good enough for the job: "he’d send them all to sleep, Roy. Woy. He hasn’t got the personality for it". He also said that the players let Hodgson down, but he was "he was too indecisive. Cast a bit of an anxiety over to the players maybe".
Gary Neville also came in for criticism, saying that he was a bad influence on Hodgson:
Gary was the wrong influence for him. Fucking 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.
He called the FA's decision to redevelop Wembley "stupid", before dropping this bomb about the organisation that now pay him £3 million a year:
They’re all about making money aren’t they? You know the FA’s the richest football association in the world? Well, I shouldn’t say that. They’re not the richest at all. What they do is they have the biggest turnover in the world with £325 million.
Oh, and he also took a pop at Prince Harry:
Harry’s a naughty boy. He’s a very naughty boy, very naughty. He shows his bottom and all sorts.
There's even more besides in the full story on the Telegraph website.
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