Allardyce calls for new football coronavirus shutdown

Sam Allardyce suffered another humiliating defeat — then called for a football lockdown.

But Allardyce claims the season should be suspended if coronavirus cases continue to soar.

He warned: “We’re out to entertain and if we’re to continue to do that then we’re fearful of someone catching a virus they’re not going to recover from?

“I don’t know how long we can carry on.

“The big help is the vaccinations happening as quickly as possible but we may need a lockdown if cases outside of football continue to rise.

“There’s talk about extra restrictions that we are going to come under in the next few weeks.

“We’ve got to do things at the training ground in smaller groups, we’ve got to spread ourselves out further and meetings have to be done in smaller groups.

“We cannot let players sit down.”

West Brom’s loss on penalties highlighted their shortage up front.

Striker Charlie Austin is off on loan to QPR and Allardyce admitted a replacement is a priority.

He added: “There’s no point in beating around the bush, we need to move players on and bring players in.

“We played up front with nobody because we’ve not got anybody.

“We need one, if not two, frontmen because we need to score goals.”