West Ham staged rebellion over Avram Grant's shabby sacking in Wigan

Published on: 26 October 2016
West Ham staged rebellion over Avram Grant's shabby sacking in Wigan
Avram Grant

West Ham players staged a rebellion when current Ghana coach Avram Grant was crudely sacked as the manager of the English side, a former defender of the Hammers has revealed.

The Israeli was sacked by the club's then CEO Karren Brady in the tunnel at final whistle of West Ham's 3-2 loss at Wigan in 2011 - the result which sent the club to relegation from the Premier League.

Danny Gabbidon has now revealed that to rub salt into Avram's relegation injury, the current Ghana coach was told to find his own way home from Wigan to London after his sacking on the pitch.

The shabby treatment of the coach led to Scott Parker leading a players' rebellion to get the coach to sit on the team's bus to London.

And Gabbidon says the Parker instigated revolt amongst the unanimously disgusted players, led to Avram being put on the bus to London.

"What the board did to Avram was really poor," Gabbidon, speaking exclusively to Westhamonline said. "They basically told him to find his own way home from the ground.

"The players were really angry about that which is why Scotty said 'that's unacceptable; If you've sacked him, fine, but he's still our manager and he travels back with the team'.

"So that's how we managed to get him back on the coach. It was just embarrassing really, that wasn't the way to conduct your business. We felt it was the right thing to do - which is why Scotty did it."

Gabbidon, who played for West Ham for six years at between 2005 and 2011, said Grant was a dead man walking just months into his stint as Hammers coach, as he lost the support of the board. "There was stuff going on behind the scenes and they were doing things without his input," he added.

"He wasn't happy with what was going on so I think when he finally got sacked, it was a bit of relief for him as well. He didn't really stand a chance in the end.

"In the final few weeks of the season the training ground wasn't a good place to be around. During the games it was difficult too as the fans were unhappy. There were even one or two players who didn't want to play in the last home game of the season [against Sunderland] because they didn't want to deal with the crowd and the atmosphere."

Gabbidon, 37, says he had concerns over the board's poor relationship with Grant.

"I hadn't been playing and Cardiff had made an enquiry, so I'd gone to David Sullivan and said 'what are the chances of leaving, because I'm coming to the end of my contract and I need to be playing'," he recalled.

"Karren Brady had said I could go but Avram Grant didn't know anything about it. When he found out he said he didn't want me to leave, so she had to retract her original statement and tell me I couldn't go as she shouldn't have said that behind the manager's back.

"They just didn't get on and were doing things behind his back, so I ended up staying for the rest of that season."

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