Why my blog isn't carrying Iain Dale's poll

Iain Dale's email

Hi all,

Some of you will have seen Sam Allardyce on Goals on Sunday dismissing the view of West Ham fans on the social media. He reckons we’re a tiny minority. I think we should all test that.

I don’t think petitions have much effect, and they sometimes look a bit desperate. I wondered about us all recommending our readers to take part in a simple one question poll – “Should Sam Allardyce be retained as manager of West Ham for the 2014-15 season?”  - yes, or no. Clearly Gold and Sullivan have a decision to take at the end of the season. I think they would welcome a poll, which they clearly can’t run themselves, but which maybe tens of thousands of supporters would take part in. But this is only worth doing if we all take part. Each of us doing it independently won’t work. I have already been in touch privately with one or two of you to check this is a go-er.

I use the SurveyMonkey polling software which only allows people to vote once. It’s as foolproof as it can be. I have set up a poll with the following questions….

1.       Should Sam Allardyce be retained as manager of West Ham for the 2014-15 season?

2.       How often do you go to home games

3.       Where do you live?

4.       What is your age?

5.       Which site did you come to this survey from? (gives all participating site names)

The poll is already in draft on SurveyMonkey. If you have any queries, suggested amendents etc, just email me by return. Copy and paste this link into your browser and you will see how it will look. [link deleted]

DO NOT PUT THE SURVEY LIVE ON YOUR SITE yet please. If possible we should all put it live on our sites at the same time. I suggest midday on Thursday 24 April.

Please confirm your site’s participation and I will add your site name to the participants list on the front page.

For the record, this needs to be seen as a joint initiative. Nowhere will I say that it is from me or West Ham Till I Die. When the poll goes live I suggest that we all run a similar text, although every site should feel free to amend it. I will draft something tomorrow.

All feedback welcome.

Kind regards

Iain Dale

West Ham Till I Die

My reply

Hi Iain

Thanks for your email.

I am not in favour of such a poll and therefore won't be putting the link on my site.

I believe the owners already have a pretty good gauge of supporters' opinion, which previous polls have suggested is ambivalent. I think another poll will simply demonstrate the same thing (or perhaps a 60:40 split one way or the other depending on the result of the next match, such is the fickle nature of football). If it were the case that the vast majority of fans wanted Sam Allardyce out and the owners were not listening then I might support such a poll - but I don't think that's the case.

This exercise will serve to foster the belief amongst a section of fans that there are irreconcilable differences between themselves and the club's management, which requires them to resort to polls telling the board how they need to act. This notion of "them and us" is not in anyone's interests.

Of course it is important that the voice of the fans is heard, but is that not already the case? They express their opinions at matches, through social media, through radio phone ins, through the Supporters Advisory Board and through a million different internet forums.

There also appears to me to be one or two flaws with such a poll. While the concept of filtering results by how often the participant attends matches does have a certain attraction, there is no way of knowing how genuine the responses are. More importantly, a 'yes or no' question seems to me inappropriate for what is not a black-and-white issue. Many fans, like myself, would answer the first question with an answer along the lines of, "it really depends what the realistic alternatives are".

Sorry to not be of help.

Kind regards

Neil