BIG SAM CALLS END TO 14-YEAR RAFA WAR
SKIPPER Chris Brunt is ready to stay if West Brom go down and believes their recent form can fuel a promotion push.
The bottom club are unbeaten since Alan Pardew was sacked but are eight points adrift and still look doomed to the drop.
After drawing with Swansea and beating Manchester United, Albion salvaged a point against Liverpool having trailed 2-0.
Midfielder Brunt (above), 33, has triggered a new 12-month deal. He said: “I’ll be here next year unless anybody tells me otherwise.
“Everybody has to accept their bit of responsibility for what’s gone on this year and I’m no different.
“I think if we can get the right blend next year and have a good go it could be a positive season for us.
“Every year in the Premier League you’re throwing millions at it to just be a survivor. There are probably 10 clubs who could be in the situation we’re in. This year unfortunately it’s been us.
“It’s disappointing but for a few of us the club means a lot and you don’t get that in football very often nowadays.
“Players tend to come and go quite a lot and we’ve a group of lads who have been here a long time, seen worse times and will hopefully know what to do to get the club going back in the right direction. “It’s going to be a big summer for everybody, and a tough one for some people at board level. “It’s up to us to make sure we get the right ones in. We don’t want to admit defeat yet because over the last few weeks we’ve given ourselves a glimmer of hope.
“But realistically we’re going to have to put a squad together to try to bounce back from a tough division and need to make sure we get the balance right.” SAM ALLARDYCE claims that his bitter 14-year feud with Rafa Benitez is over.
Allardyce’s running battle with Benitez has been one of the longest in the Premier League and dates back to 2004 when he was Bolton boss and the Spaniard had just arrived at Liverpool.
Big Sam handed Benitez his first Premier League defeat, leaving the former Reds chief unimpressed with his style, and the pair repeatedly clashed over the years, exchanging barbs.
But ahead of their Goodison Park meeting tonight, Allardyce said he is too old to be at war with the Newcastle manager.
“There is no history with Rafa,” said the Everton boss. “That’s water under the bridge. Fourteen goddam years ago when he just got here, I was winding up anyone I could. And it worked well at times.
“That doesn’t happen now. I wouldn’t go back to that. I’m too long in the tooth and mature for that.”
Allardyce has mellowed so much at 63 that he even praised the job Benitez has done in guiding his former club Newcastle to mid-table safety, despite having little money to spend.
“From a difficult period they have recovered and got back into the Premier League,” he added.
“They’ve turned it round. They have put together a run of games and we’ll see a better Newcastle than we saw up there.
“Rafa has progressed very well. He has expressed his disappointment with not having enough funds.
“We can all say we don’t have enough funds and what he did in January was excellent.”
Allardyce wants to consolidate Everton’s top-half position and back up his tongue-in-cheek claim to the fans that he deserves 11 out of 10 for the job he has done since taking over in November.
“We want to finish in the top half if we can,” he said.
“You want to finish well because it’s been a lot of turmoil this season.
“The only reason I’m here is the team wasn’t good enough before I got here. That was the opinion of the board.
“I came in to sort that out and we have managed to achieve a certain amount of success.”