Sam Allardyce has told the Lancashire Evening Post that he has sympathy for Simon Grayson following his ill-fated spell at Sunderland.

In the summer, Grayson decided to leave Preston North End, a team he had done very well with after getting them promoted back to the Sky Bet Championship via the play-offs, to go manage Sunderland. They had just been relegated from the Premier League and were looking for someone to replace David Moyes following his resignation.

However Grayson’s time at the Stadium of Light would go badly. He would only win once in the league and the Black Cats would then slip into the relegation zone. Even though most expected the rebuild of Sunderland to take a while, this was not acceptable and Grayson soon found himself sacked.

But former Sunderland manager Allardyce has said that it was always going to be a tricky job for Grayson due to the situation at the club and that he has plenty of sympathy for how it would end up.

He said: “When you saw what Simon did with Preston North End, and on a very limited budget, it was obviously good business by the owner to bring him in,”

“He showed at Preston that he was more than capable of working on very little funds and still having success with a team.”

“Unfortunately, the fall-out of being relegated, which I experienced at West Ham, leaves the club in a very difficult position.”

“Those lads will be scarred mentally, they’ll obviously want to leave and there’s cut backs, redundancies and sackings which follow.”

“That’s tough on everyone, and it makes it almost impossible to get the right mood and spirit back into the club.”

“I’m not sure how they’ll do it, but I really hope they do.”