A controversial pundit who has a feud with David Sullivan has shockingly defended the West Ham owner.

West Ham has been a club full of internal conflict for an age now. Whether it’s the fans against the board, the fans against the owners or the fans against themselves, there’s constantly something going on which causes controversy.

While the protests against the owners have stopped in recent years, the moyes in versus moyes out debate has taken over with it resulting in the Scotsman leaving the club at the end of the season.

However, despite it being generally accepted as the right decision now, there was still fury as to how the whole ordeal was handled. David Sullivan was having talks with other managers behind Moyes’ back and Tim Steidten was arranging them – resulting in him being banned from being around the players.

Surprisingly though, former Crystal Palace owner Simon Jordan has backed Sullivan in the way he has gone about things despite having choice words for him in the past. “I mean I’m the last person to defend Sullivan but [I’m not sure] how Sullivan could have handled the situation with David Moyes better,” Jordan exclaimed on TALKsport. “Given that they offered David Moyes a contract in February that David Moyes didn’t sign, so how could Sullivan and West Ham have handled David Moyes’ exit better?”

“So if the club sat on its haunches until the summer, everyone would say ‘What are you doing? Why are you not interviewing people, why are you not preparing?’”

“The observation about the courtesy that [was not] extended to David.  I’m going to bristle at this idea that a football should sit back and extend this wonderful courtesy of not interviewing people because of this optics for the media.”

“It’s a very curious position. First of all most managers like stability. So it’s a ridiculous observation that people leave it until [the end of their current contract].”

“[If he did decided to wait] then he’s a bloody fool then isn’t he? I mean who leaves a contract to expire before you negotiate a new one? Nobody in their right mind, least of all a football person!”

For once, Jordan has hit the nail on the head. In what world is a club ever going to just wait it out to start assessing their options. It would leave them in a perilous situation when it came to recruiting in the Summer and David Moyes should have known talks would begin.

The only thing that he isn’t right in saying is about how Moyes had a contract ready to sign. For whatever reason, he exaggerated how far along these talks were and, therefore, you can’t really blame Jordan for making the mistake. Moyes may have a bitter taste in his mouth but, realistically, what else could the board have done?