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Thatcher killed football - Big Sam

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Rosco

Rosco

Worse than Brendan
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http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/09072011/58/premier-league-allardyce-thatcher-killed-football.html

West Ham manager Sam Allardyce has blamed Margaret Thatcher for "killing football" and creating a modern-day generation of unfit, obese children in the United Kingdom.

Allardyce says that all UK sports, not just football, are suffering because of policies adopted by former Prime Minister Thatcher's Conservative governments throughout the 1980s.

In a scathing attack in The S** newspaper on Saturday, Allardyce said: "Since Margaret Thatcher stopped teachers being paid extra money for coaching sports after school, all sporting activities have diminished on a competitive basis.

"Kids are now more obese and unfit than ever. All the prime young athletes we were ready to develop just aren't there, so we get a lesser quality of player.
"It has not just undermined our game, it has undermined many sports in this country and created an unhealthy child. Thatcher killed football, there is no doubt about it."

A recent report stated that one in three children in Britain are obese or overweight and that 32 per cent of children play less than an hour of sport a week.

In the last 20 years, around 5,000 school playing fields have been sold off or built over as England's men's national team have continually floundered in attempts to repeat their 1966 World Cup triumph.

Allardyce, a keen student of sporting education, continued: "Look at how little kids do to what I did. I was a 200 metres runner, a 4x400m relay runner and a triple jumper.

"I was a batsman in cricket, a freestyler in swimming and swam for the town. I did the pommel horse in gymnastics and I was really good on the trampoline, as well as being a footballer.

"Kids don't do any of that now. All of that sporting activity allowed me to play in the top division in this country."

Allardyce, who recently took over at West Ham, maintains the consequences of Thatcher's policies now mean clubs are having to sign up children at increasingly young ages to ensure they have opportunities to flourish.

"This was a working-class game but it's only at private schools where the children get the sports opportunities I had - and even then a lot of them don't play football, it's mainly rugby," said the ex-Bolton Wanderers and Blackburn Rovers boss.

"Despite putting in place all sorts of advanced academy systems at clubs we are only producing half the players the school system used to."

The FA estimates it takes 10,000 hours of training and education from the age of about seven or eight to be able to be good enough to play professional football - accepting a child has the talent to begin with.

Allardyce added: "Even a club like Manchester United can only provide 4,000 hours at the moment. It's hard to do more because parents have to drive their kids there four nights a week as well as on a Sunday.

"Until we wake up and realise how important school sport is to our kids we will never repair the damage," he concluded
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Re: Thatcher killed football - Big Sam

Hard to argue. Thatcher made me fat
 
I think it's more a case of more and more parents find it easier to let their kids sit in front of the telly than take them to sports clubs or other activities and a fear of letting them out in the street to run about.
 
I think sam has a point. Although the lazy P.E teachers at my old school didn't help. We had two marvellous pitches that were hardly ever used, it was easier for them to let us organise ourselves into teams and play 5-a-side indoors.
 
I don't think Thatcher is responsible for Sky sports and Fifa 11. . .
 
[quote author=Jack D Rips link=topic=46059.msg1362605#msg1362605 date=1310249557]
So who made Fat Sam fat?
[/quote]

Mrs Allardyce

regards
 
Well i was a child in thatchers britain and i also swam for the town did the pommel horse and was really good on the trampoline so stick it Sam.
 
Thats two people in this thread now who have claimed to be 'good on the trampoline'
Isnt that like being good at walking.
Look i can bounce.
Whoopie.
 
Its not the best advert for keeping your kids active though is it?

'Get them to do lots more sport and with a bit of luck they might grow up to be the just like Sam Allardyce'
 
[quote author=Sheik Yerbouti link=topic=46059.msg1362589#msg1362589 date=1310246051]
I think it's more a case of more and more parents find it easier to let their kids sit in front of the telly than take them to sports clubs or other activities and a fear of letting them out in the street to run about.
[/quote]

This is a good point. I mean, my lad does football and my daughter does Gymnastics (partly because my missus runs the class), but aside from that they don't really go out much. My Lad is getting to the age now (13) where he does have a freer reign and he'll go out and play football with his mates on other estates (but within reason and only until a reasonable time), but the two younger ones don't really do anything other than sometimes play on the front, it IS easier to know they're in the house even if they are watching TV or playing computer games.

I took a walk down the local shops last night at about 7:30pm and I really despair. Two girls came in the shop behind me, one was about 8 and the other no more than 5 or 6, both dressed like you'd expect a teen to dress and walking the streets freely. Some parents are bellends.

Lolz @ Richey.
 
[quote author=Richey link=topic=46059.msg1363111#msg1363111 date=1310372886]
Its not the best advert for keeping your kids active though is it?

'Get them to do lots more sport and with a bit of luck they might grow up to be the just like Sam Allardyce'
[/quote]

That's just your perception, though.

Personally I hate perception.
 
Big Sam ate a football would have been more accurate...

Besides, Big Sam has done more to kill football with his playing style than most.
 
fatsam.jpg




"The obesity epidemic in this country is deplorable!"
 
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