Allardyce latest in a long line of failures

Two-hundred-and-thirty-nine days later, and while a new owner and chairman have arrived to replace Freddy Shepherd, it has become obvious that the most important aspect of the footballing culture at St James' Park has not changed. If things are not going to plan on the pitch, it remains the manager that must pay with his job.

Allardyce has joined a long list of Newcastle managers who have tried and failed to lift a once-proud football club out of the doldrums.

That he was unable to guide the Magpies to their first piece of domestic silverware since 1955 was perhaps to be expected given the paucity of the squad he inherited upon replacing Glenn Roeder and the financially polarised Premier League in which he was forced to ply his trade. That he was only given seven-and-a-half months in which to try, though, is impossible to excuse.

When Shepherd dismissed his managers, at least he had the good grace to give them a decent opportunity to prove themselves first.

Mike Ashley arrived with a reputation for ruthlessness when he completed his buy-out of the Magpies in June, but few could have expected the sportswear magnate to be quite so quick on the trigger.

True, Allardyce was not Ashley's appointment, and by sitting in the away end at Premier League grounds up and down the country, the Newcastle owner has been exposed to the festering discontent that has accompanied the former Bolton boss' attempts to mould a squad and side in his own image.

But it is hard to see what will be gained by subjecting Newcastle to yet another bout of upheaval and uncertainty midway through the season.

Allardyce was supposed to be the manager that eradicated the short-termist thinking that had hampered the Magpies' attempts to re-join the elite band of title contenders at the top of the Premier League.

He was supposed to be the cutting-edge practitioner able to instigate a five-year plan that would gradually return Newcastle to their former glories.

And he was supposed to be the harbinger of a new era in which short-term pain would be accepted as the necessary price to pay for long-term gain.

Instead, he has become yet another stop gap, another body sacrificed on the funeral pyre labelled misguided ambition. At the start of the season, with a new manager and new chairman on board, Newcastle supporters were dreaming of a brave new era. This morning, they find themselves in exactly the same position as when Roeder was sacked, or when Sir Bobby Robson, Ruud Gullit and Kenny Dalglish were jettisoned before him. Fanatical followers of a club in a perpetual state of crisis.

The timing of Allardyce's dismissal makes no sense at all, yet Ashley will claim, perhaps with some justification, that the rationale behind it over-rules all other considerations.

Almost every Newcastle supporter contacted last night was shell-shocked at the day's events. It would be wrong, though, to claim that a majority were disappointed.

Allardyce was an unpopular figure when he was appointed in May and, since then, his popularity ratings have nose-dived.

In part, that is a simple reflection of results. Eight wins from 24 matches is a poor return from a squad that includes the likes of Michael Owen, Mark Viduka and Shay Given.

Yet results have only told half the story. Newcastle supporters might have accepted the odd defeat if their side had been playing open, attractive football. As it was, the defeats were accompanied by the same pragmatic, defensive style that Allardyce pioneered at Bolton's Reebok Stadium.

Five-man midfields were the story of the day. Smith and Nicky Butt became the heartbeat of the Newcastle midfield despite the lack of creativity that their partnership entailed. Defenders were instructed to pump the ball forward at the earliest opportunity.

The idea that Newcastle supporters would prefer a 4-3 defeat to a 1-0 win is not rooted in reality. But marry unattractive football with a lengthy run of defeats and, at St James' at least, you are dicing with your managerial death.

The first signs of that death emerged in November as Newcastle conceded seven goals in two games en route to back-to-back home defeats against Portsmouth and Liverpool.

If nothing else, Allardyce was supposed to guarantee defensive stability, yet with summer signings Claucio Cacapa, David Rozehnal and Habib Beye to the fore, the Midlander found himself presiding over a defence that was as porous and disorganised as ever.

At the same time, stories began to emerge suggesting Allardyce had lost the dressing room. A delegation of senior players met the embattled Magpies boss to complain about his style of play and negative thinking. Others privately aired their grievance at his decision to hand Geremi the captain's armband. None were particularly enamoured with his Tyneside tenure.

Wins over Birmingham and Fulham temporarily steadied the ship, but the pressure returned when Newcastle slumped to a miserable 1-0 defeat at Wigan on Boxing Day.

The parallels with Graeme Souness' reign were obvious, and things got worse 24 hours later when Joey Barton was arrested following an alleged incident in Liverpool city centre.

Allardyce had promised to tame Barton's wild side when he was appointed, yet here was his flagship summer signing being taken into police custody at 5.30 in the morning.

Suddenly, there was a sense of things spiralling out of control, and last weekend's FA Cup third-round tie at Stoke was widely billed as a make-or-break game for the now under-siege Allardyce.

The subsequent 0-0 draw initially looked like buying him more time, but three days after his side drew a blank at the Britannia Stadium, Allardyce found himself forced out of the door.

At the end of his inaugural address, he claimed: "It's a big job, but I'm more than capable of doing it."

Big Sam, big job, big ambitions. This morning, though, Newcastle United are just in another big mess.