Big Sam Allardyce may be becoming increasingly unpopular at Everton, but in the wake of the survey which asked Everton fans to rate the former England coach, he remained defiant, shifting the blame for the survey onto Everton's head of marketing:
I'm only answering this question once, in fact I'm not taking the question, right the survey. The director of marketing and communications has clearly slipped up. Our department has not been asked what do we think of this survey that was going out.
It was a big mistake. I think it's allowed you to write some beautiful headlines on that situation. The actual survey question was what do you think of the manager, the players and the staff and obviously our manager and director of marketing clearly is not a great understander of football and how football works because he's into marketing and branding and market research.
Just for the record I'd like to point out that 'understander' is not a word in the English dictionary.
Allardyce confirmed that he received an apology from club chairman Bill Kenwright and when asked by one plucky journalist asked what mark he would give himself, his answer was typically brash: "Piss off... 11".
