Alan Curbishley admits his legal case against West Ham United has damaged his career.
Having taken over at Upton Park in December 2006 with the club seeming doomed to relegation, the escape he masterminded, culminating in a 1-0 win at Old Trafford on the final day of the season, saved West Ham millions. Having both played for and supported them, he is well aware of the scale of the achievement.
"We won seven of the last nine with the same group of players who got themselves into that mess, so I got something a bit special out of them," Curbishley told the London Evening Standard. "Nobody will ever put together a run to escape relegation like that again."
The club's purchase in 2006 by an Icelandic group was loudly celebrated by many fans, who believed wrongly they were about to receive a huge financial boost.
"They didn't have the money, they'd borrowed it," said Curbishley. "That's why the club's in debt. When they left, they left it with that debt. The problems they've got now all come from that."
It was a decision made in the boardroom, as a result of that financial chaos, which changed his career.
"I had a clause in my contract, saying they couldn't sell players without my agreement, because if I'm going to get the sack, I want it to be for my decisions and not theirs," he said.
"Then they sold George McCartney on deadline day to bring in £6million and kept me out of it. The position was impossible.
"If I'd allowed it to go on, I'd have been finished. They knew what my reaction would be, and they went and did it anyway, which is why I'm where I am now.
"Although I've won the case [against West Ham], I don't know what else I've won, because I'm not working, it's not my fault and it's been 20 months.
"After I left but before the case ended, the people who were running the place were still there, walking around the boardrooms of other clubs at away games, so I don't suppose they did me any favours."
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