Banter Monday: Moyes Premier League return & Sunderland Rangers eye McCoist-Smith dream ticket

If you didn’t laugh...

The banter has reached fever pitch as the new week gets underway with the news David Moyes is set for a return to the Premier League after jettisoning the Black Cats into the Championship last season, and the prospect that Sunderland Rangers could appoint Ally McCoist and Walter Smith in a crackpot dream ticket.

Madness...

Moyes seems to be in pole position for a crack at the West Ham job with the news Slaven Bilic has been dismissed after a poor start to the season. Certainly the dour Scot distanced himself from the vacant Scotland job in the belief that club management is still something he’s good at.

Gossip down in that there London claims Moyes has already agreed a six-month deal to rescue the Hammers from dropping into the Championship. Good luck with that one. West Ham are due a relegation of course after six seasons in the Premier League and may have appointed the very man to seal their fate.

Photo by Stu Forster/Getty Images

Perhaps it is the dearth of decent available managers which means a dismal failure like Moyes can walk straight back into a ‘top’ job. One look at the betting market for next Sunderland boss certainly proves that.

John O’Shea currently heads the bookies’ choices to succeed Simon Grayson despite seemingly having little realistic chance of heading up a coaching team which would likely consist of Sunday’s caretakers Stockdale and McKinlay.

But it is the prospect - as elevated by the Scottish Sun yesterday - of Ally McCoist and Walter Smith reuniting with Martin Bain at Sunderland which has really ramped up the banter on Wearside today.

After last week’s surprise appearance from owner Ellis Short to address the deepening crisis at the Stadium of Light, whatever hopes the billionaire financier had of galvanising his failing club by giving a rare interview, the dual appointment of the duo formerly of Ibrox will dash any remaining goodwill.

If Short really does care - and he told us he does last week - he must act and veto the Bain-lunacy enveloping Sunderland AFC.

Simon Grayson’s failure is largely on Martin Bain as is much of the destruction which is still being felt as a result of his sticking by Moyes last season.

The Sunderland chief executive surely cannot be allowed to bring McCoist back to Wearside three decades since he left as a player. There is a reason the 55-year-old has never been near another managerial job after leaving Rangers in 2014.

Short simply must take control of the hunt for a new boss to prevent Bain from mucking up his third appointment since arriving in the north east. McCoist’s sole attribute for the Sunderland job is that he worked in an even bigger shit-show when at Rangers. Get in.

Photo by Mark Runnacles/Getty Images for Andy Murray Live

Alternatively, there is gossip still suggesting the Black Cats fancy handing Shrewsbury Town boss Paul Hurst the chance to step up and try his luck at the Stadium of Light. The 43-year-old has his Shrews side at the top of League One and may yet be afforded the opportunity to keep Sunderland out of said league.

Either way, with no domestic football next weekend Sunderland do at least have a little time by which to ponder this crucial appointment.

Bottom of the league, fresh from a derby defeat, and now needing something like 40 points from this season’s remaining thirty fixtures to avoid the double-drop, the madness at the Stadium of Light is sure to continue this week.