I have been blowing bubbles since my early twenties. In the football sense that is.

As a young sports reporter working in London I regularly covered what then really was the Beautiful Game - especially when it was played by West Ham United.

I always looked forward with relish to being assigned to fixtures at Upton Park during the sixties, because I knew I was promised football played with grace and guile by a team which included that wonderful World Cup-winning trinity of Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters, schooled under the imaginative stewardship of master tactician Ron Greenwood.

The football flowed and the crowds roared their appreciation - even when West Ham didn't win.

I was there one Boxing Day when they lost something like 8-3 to Blackburn Rovers, and still received a standing ovation at the end because the fans knew they were trying to play the game as it should be played.

For this was football's Culture Club. The Academy of Football, they called it. Some still do, though only out of misty-eyed nostalgia.

West Ham's glory days, which included FA Cup glory in 1964 - the trophy held aloft here by Bobby Moore - are a long and distant memory ©Getty Images



These days I wouldn't call myself a Hammers fan. But I have remained a follower, though I haven't seen them play at Upton Park for years.

But many of those who have say it isn't the same anymore.

Fast forward from 1966 to 2014. Flair, finesse and technique have been erased by a grim-faced philosophy that lacks adventure and is embedded with graft, not guile.

So much so that when they beat Hull 2-1 last week the current manager, Sam Allardyce, was soundly booed, sarcastically cupping his ear to the crowd in astonishment.

He professed to be perplexed. "I couldn't believe it," he declared. "I've never been in a place where we've won and got booed."

Later, on a radio phone-in, one season ticket holder explained: "It's so one-dimensional. This is the most turgid, boring side...it's just awful to watch."

Sam Allardyce could barely believe the crowd's reaction after his team defeated Hull ©AFP/Getty Images



Well, West Ham ground out another 2-1 win last night at Sunderland, once more relying on Allardyce's Route One game: boot it up the middle to Andy Carroll and hope he scores. Well he did. So it works.

But still the fans aren't appeased, some even calling for Allardyce's instant dismissal, even though it seems he has managed to keep the team's head above the relegation waterline.

And surely that's what makes him bombproof.

For you can bet Big Sam's job is safe at least until the Hammers are safely ensconced in the Olympic Stadium in 2016.

You see, West Ham's board recognise that there is only one word in the footy lexicon that matters until then. Forget flair, forget entertainment. It's survival. Which also translates as success.

And for one very good reason. They are terrified of going down because of what it would mean.

They are aware that Allardyce's dour approach may be the only way to avoid what would be a national embarrassment.

For if West Ham are no longer a Premier League club when they kick off their first season in the expensively adapted venue, there will be some red faces not only in their own boardroom but at Boris Johnson's mayoral eyrie high in City Hall, the offices of the London Olympic Legacy Corporation, the Premier League and Football Association - all architects of the dream to bring top-class football to the Queen Elizabeth Park.

Sebastian Coe won't be too thrilled, either.

West Ham v Chelsea or Manchester United would be a fitting Premier League curtain-raiser: West Ham v Millwall or Barnsley in the Championship doesn't have quite the same cachet about it.

West Ham v Manchester Untied or West Ham v Millwall? There's plenty at stake as the Hammers prepare to move into the Olympic Stadium ©AFP/Getty Images



What an ignominy that would be. And what a kick in the teeth for Olympic Legacy.

Naturally, West Ham's vice-chairman Karren Brady has given Allardyce her full backing despite the jeers from those disaffected fans, calling his tactics "prudent" at this stage of the season.

Well she would, wouldn't she, because she knows that West Ham have to stay up - whatever the cost to the club's once-cherished reputation for attractive, fan-friendly football.

She and the club's co-owner David Golf believe Allardyce, who restored West Ham to the Premier League at the first attempt after Avram Grant had taken them to relegation in 2011, is on course to maintain West Ham's top-flight status until they are due to move into the Olympic stadium.

Gold, responding to the fans' displeasure, tweeted: "Every season we remain in the Premier League, we will get stronger and closer to going to the OS (Olympic Stadium) debt-free. This must be our priority."

But answering another follower on Twitter, he described the performance as "dogged, determined, lacked flair but three very important points".

Once in the Olympic Stadium it might be time to start blowing a few bubbles again, replacing muscle with artistry.

However Allardyce's CV suggests he will not be the man to implement such a policy. He has never been one for passing fancies. Ask the supporters of Bolton and Blackburn, where his tenures were similarly based on unashamed pragmatism.

The bubbles will be heading for the Olympic Stadium in 2016, but will the move herald a change in philosophy for the team? ©Getty Images



Some might argue that the attitude of West Ham's supporters is naive, even unique in sport, where the prevailing dictum is that winning is everything; a la UK Sport's "no compromise" approach to funding which significantly is now to be challenged in Parliament by former sports minister Kate Hoey. But I am not so sure, for there is a much broader picture here.

We British have always had a sympathetic spot for those who set out to provide enjoyment or have a bit of charisma about them even if they fail to grab the big prize.

Flamboyant distance runner Dave "Bootsie" Bedford was a prime example. Remember, too, the public adoration of boxers Sir Henry Cooper, Frank Bruno and more recently George Groves who, after being booed into the ring was cheered out of it when he clearly had the beating of world super-middleweight champion Carl Froch before being robbed of victory by a refereeing blunder. Groves is now a national hero.

So was Gemma Gibbons in 2012 when she had to settle for an Olympic silver and sobbed while dedicating it to her late mother.

Then there was the overwhelming support for athlete Derek Redmond who, at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, tore his hamstring in the 400 metres semi-final but continued the race limping and, helped by his father who dashed from the crowd, managed to complete a full lap of the track as the crowd gave him a standing ovation. One of the most poignant and best-remembered moments in Olympic history

More often than not we admire a plucky loser more than we do a boring winner, something the ear-cupping Allardyce will never be able to comprehend.

Meantime we can be certain of one thing. Sam will play it again...at least until 2016.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Games, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.