Sam Allardyce: a justified sting – and exemplary journalism

The case of Big Sam is the latest example of the power of an original, painstaking piece of journalism, writes Raymond Snoddy

At 10pm on Monday night The Daily Telegraph website went live with its allegations about Sam Allardyce, the England football manager, followed by pages of coverage in the newspaper the following morning.

Within 24 hours Allardyce managed something that is likely to remain unequalled – retaining his job for only 67 days, an event marked by no less than 12 pages of detailed disclosures, news and comment.

They include allegations that eight current or former Premier League managers have been willing to accept “bungs” for player transfers – most denied it, of course.

The Telegraph says it will disclose the name of an assistant manager at a leading club later this week who was actually filmed accepting a £5,000 cash payment from undercover reporters posing as representatives of a Far Eastern firm interested in investing in players.

The paper even had an up-to-the minute Matt cartoon on the story that broke during the evening: “He leaves with an unblemished record – played one, won one.”

The Daily Telegraph and its exemplary journalism made near-instant action inevitable.

What is really interesting is the scale of the effort and the resources that must have been required to make such a thing possible.

10 months of undercover reporting and filming have revealed the corrupt under-belly of English football and the greed that has been fuelled by the billions injected into the game by television rights – billions that television viewers are paying for week in week out.

When undercover filming is used, the word “entrapment” is seldom far behind, and indeed Big Sam is already alleging that “entrapment” had won – something that BBC news naturally led with in its radio reporting, presumably in the interests of fairness and balance.

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Five years ago The Daily Telegraph was criticised by the then press regulator, the Press Complaints Commission, for sending reporters – who just happened to be attractive young women – to pose as constituents of business secretary Vince Cable.

He was recorded boasting that he had “declared war” on Rupert Murdoch.

The PPC was not convinced that the “fishing expedition” justified the level of subterfuge.

This time around there is no doubt whatever. Big Sam condemned himself out of his own mouth and he didn’t seem to be under any undue pressure.

The Allardyce interviews are only the peak of a much more broadly based investigation into dodgy football agents and their intermediaries and the weakness of regulation and supervision within what must be called the football industry.

To justify such reporting methods, only two major tests have to be met.

Is such reporting in the public interest? Here the answer is a massive, unequivocal yes.

Could the material have been obtained without the use of such subterfuge? Obviously not.

There is the additional rider that the organisers of such undercover reporting should not lead the witnesses excessively as the late News of the World were sometimes accused of doing.

Subjects should be given the opportunity to reveal their natural stance, their true beliefs and inherent naivety.

In this case Allardyce was allowed to exhibit his natural taste for beer, money and bragging.

The case of Big Sam, and revelations yet to come, is the latest example of the power of an original, painstaking piece of journalism, subsequently amplified by the combined ranks of the media to effect change.

To the extent that the Football Association paused at all, it was to review the Telegraph coverage and hear Big Sam’s response, but crucially to gauge the impact of the story.

When it was clear the impact was enormous all around the world it was inevitable that Sam Allardyce would be sacked if he hadn’t agreed to go “by mutual consent”, with a £1 million pay-off according to the Daily Mail or, more plausibly, with nothing according to The Sun.

Could an online publisher have produced such an opus of work? Almost certainly not. If such a thing has happened it has been difficult to spot or remember.

The movie Spotlight is about a newspaper, the Boston Globe, and its long-term investigation into child abuse in the Catholic church in Boston, not a website.

It is fashionable, and entirely legitimate, to talk of newsbrands rather than mere newspapers these days. You then can add declining newspaper circulation to increasing – largely – digital footprints and argue that the combination means that the overall impact is the greatest that traditional publishers have ever experienced.

True but such a creation is a little misleading.

The Telegraph did indeed launch its story first on its web site complete with film, a vital plus, but is it conceivable that the story would have had so much impact without the pages of detailed revelations and analysis that quickly followed?

There is the other current problem with the newsbrands concept – the unfortunate differential between the money earned from print revenues and those from digital.

The halo effect from the overall reach numbers is in danger of obscuring the fact that its is the earning power of print and print alone – at least for now – that is capable of funding such long-term investigative campaigns.

As the further Telegraph revelations were rippling ever outwards the Independent online was doubtless accumulating lots of hits with Twitter offerings such as How Middle Class Are You – take the quiz, or The Benefits of Migration in four simple charts.

The Telegraph comment was also sharp and to the larger point.

“This affair is about much more than one manager’s career. Confidence in football as a whole hangs in the balance. The river of money that flows from fans’ pockets into the professional game may not run forever. The FA and the clubs have much to lose if they fail to recognise what is at stake here,” a Telegraph leader argued.

Then there was the piece by Damian Collins, acting chairman of the Commons Select Committee for Culture, Media and Sport arguing that it was time for a new football law blocking those who break FA rules from taking stakes in clubs.

This, Collins said, would give the FA a similar discretionary power over registration of club ownership to that held by Ofcom on broadcasting licences. Overall an immaculate campaign.

And finally on the pitch, in his short reign Sam Allardyce promised new players and new levels of energy, confidence and pace.

In his only match in charge against Slovakia earlier this month, it was same old, same old and he was only rescued from derision by a Lallana strike five minutes into injury time.