Play-off memories revived as Whites'

boss surveys another Premiership crisis

Bolton could now be looking at UEFA spot

WHAT MIGHT

FINANCIAL

KNIGHTMARE

Manager laments

lost season

BARRY Knight's ears will have been burning this week when Sam Allardyce opened old wounds to highlight the financial pressures that are making life intolerable for an ever-increasing number of top flight clubs.

The Wanderers' boss turned the clock back to May 2000 and the part played by the Orpington official in that unforgettable Play-off semi-final at Ipswich.

Had they won that night - as they believe they would had they not suffered so severely at the hands of card-wielding referee Knight - Wanderers may not have been forced to sell Eidur Gudjohnsen and Claus Jensen that summer or Mark Fish during the following season.

Wanderers had the character to bounce back and won promotion to the Premiership a year later but Allardyce will never forget or forgive Mr Knight for setting the club back 12 months.

He maintains: "We'd have kept Fish, Gudjohnsen and Jensen ... put them together with what we've got now and you'd be talking about us being top half, top six even ... Uefa Cup!

"Those boys have been playing for Charlton and Chelsea for the past three years and doing extremely well.

"What might have happened is quite staggering to think about - all over one referee! Arguably we could have been in the Premiership sooner than we were."

It pained Allardyce at the time to lose such good, young talent and it worries him now to see how the fear of financial consequences piles intense pressure on even the biggest of clubs.

"What is very scary are the whispers I hear about Newcastle being devastated financially because they haven't made the Champions League," he explains.

"We've got a two-tier system in the Premiership that can be financially devastating: fall out of the Premiership and you're devastated - look at the table in the First Division last week and you saw four sides in the bottom six who were in the Premiership less than two seasons ago.

"And if you see what the European Champions League is bringing in and then budgeting for that and you don't make it ... they are talking about not being able to cope financially ... £10 million out of their revenue. It's just too much to be playing football under that financial pressure.

"But it seems that's what it's all about nowadays. Money! There's lots of it but never enough of it."