Big Sam hails positive approach

Sam Allardyce believes things are looking rosy for West Ham United - on and off the pitch.

While Big Sam's team seek to go top of the npower Championship for the first time when they play Nottingham Forest on Saturday, Thursday saw Joint-Chairmen David Sullivan and David Gold mark two years at the Hammers helm.

The manager was in understandably upbeat mood as he made his final preparations for this weekend's fixture, speaking positively about his side's prospects and glowingly of his relationship with Mr Sullivan and Mr Gold.

Taking first the football side of things, Big Sam is eager for his players to push on, even if they do reach the summit come 5pm on Saturday.

"I think it would be great for us. It has been a very difficult job catching Southampton and when we've finally got closer and closer we've then ultimately failed and then slipped back again," he said.

"For most of this season we've climbed the mountain and then we've just slipped off the peak and back down slightly again. What we can do this time is stay on top of the peak of the mountain and try and win the three points to get a little bit ahead of them even though it might only be for a short period of time.

"More importantly it may then create an even wider gap between us and third and fourth."

While the Hammers hold a four-point lead over third-place Cardiff City going into the weekend, the manager is aware that a host of clubs could still mount a late charge for the automatic promotion positions.

"My worry is the challenge of Middlesbrough, Cardiff, Hull City, Reading now, even a big danger is Birmingham.

"I think that Chris Hughton and his squad, looking at the changes he made from Millwall to [the midweek FA Cup win over] Wolves and winning both games, are strong.

"I know Millwall were down to nine men, but the changes he made and then to beat a Premier League side in the cup and to use a different set of players in different positions shows you just how strong a squad they are.

"So, the two-way scenario is, yes we would like to be at the top and we'd like to stay at the top but we've also got to fend off any of those super-duper late runs."

Concentrating on his relationship with the Joint-Chairmen, Big Sam said his dealings had been overwhelmingly positive during the eight months since his appointment.

"At the moment, the relationship is as good as I've had. As in any business, it is vitally important how you communicate with your bosses, and I think that my levels of communication have always been one of my strengths as a manager - it hasn't just been about managing players, it's been about managing all the different factors of the Football Club.

"The biggest factor is managing in terms of how we communicate between ourselves for the good of the Football Club. It's about how we go about doing our jobs in a very difficult industry and making sure that we work as harmoniously as hard as we can.

"For me, adjusting to how they run the Football Club has been what I've done and communicating to them in a way that they like to be communicated in.

"That has made life for me easier, to get on with the football side of it and to try and get the players out on the field and continue to work. So that has been fine as far as I'm concerned.

"It's been a good working relationship between myself and David Sullivan particularly and David Gold in terms of whenever he wants he can come in."

Big Sam has also welcomed the Joint-Chairmen's enthusiasm in the transfer market - most notably the eye-catching move to bring captain Kevin Nolan to the Club from Premier League Newcastle United.

"In terms of transfers, we're still ambitious enough to get back in the premier league and we're ambitious enough to get players like Kevin Nolan to come and join us and that made a big statement.

"David [Sullivan] is interested in a million players and I think he really enjoys it. I think he really enjoys the nature of the transfer market and the wheeling and dealing of the 'can you find a player?' and he is obviously very knowledgeable in that direction.

"My job is to make sure that first and foremost we don't sign the wrong one, because there's that many thrown at us that it's easy to take the gamble. I want to reduce the gamble to a minimum so that when we bring in that player, 90 or 80 per cent of the time it's going to be successful."