The gap between low expectation and high ones?

[Tomo 21,685]

Many manager's have worked miracles at club's where the expectation's aren't high. Either the size of the club, the small budget or fans not being demanding has meant managers will be heroes for as much as avoiding relegation, some won't even have that used against them.

Sam Allardyce worked absolute miracles at Bolton, he had a limited budget but worked absolute miracle's in not only keeping Bolton in the league but getting them competing at the right end of the table, a couple of times they looked good for a Champions League spot but come the end that lack of depth and spending power between Bolton and the teams around them showed and they had to make do with top 8. Something that was still a remarkable achievement by Sam considering his squad must have been assembled for little more than £10m.

The job he was doing there meant he was linked with the England job, he was overlooked on that occasion but eventually did get a big job at Newcastle. Suddenly he had to deal with expectant fans and had money to spend, he was sacked by January with the club hovering in a relegation fight.

Since then Sam has recovered his reputation with Blackburn (despite his imo unfair sacking) as a man who can work miracles at club's with a limited budget and looks set to do the same at West Ham too.

Roy Hodgson is another example, came into Fulham mid season and kept them up against all odds, then got them 7th with a Uefa cup final the season after that. He massively overachieved with Fulham considering lack of expectation's and limite budget, and that got him the Liverpool job, suddenly he had expectation's and pressure and he had a absolute nightmare, he was sacked with Liverpool battling relegation and had his reputation in tatters.

Since then he went to West Brom and re built the reputation he had in Fulham days, now he has taken the England job it will be interesting to see if he can handle the pressure of being in an expectant position again.

Mark Hughes is another example of a mid table miracle man (at Blackburn and Fulham) failing miserably at a big job (City) Brendan Rodgers is currently looking like another man in that list. He has already failed in a Championship version of that transition (from Watford to Reading).

If Moyes came to Chelsea or Everton suddenly got massive backers who would back Moyes with unlimited cash, will he be able to deal with the sudden massive expectation's after all these years? will he be an exception to his growing rule or will he join Big Sam and co?

Do the jump into big jobs too soon? maybe they should take up a job abroad first out of the spotlight (Benfica for example) then these type of manager's might be more ready to take on a massive job and succeed.

If we were in a position we were in the early 90's today i would genuinely take all of those manager's mentioned in a heartbeat, but considering where we are and the expectations our owner has i wouldn't want us touching any of them.

Do you have your own idea of why manager's that work miracles like Sam, Roy and co fail when it comes to having huge expectations on them? Is it too big a jump in one go or are they just not good enough and mid table miracle work is 'their level' so to speak?