Sam Allardyce hires mind guru to give his Blackburn squad positive throughts
Published 00:00 21/02/09 By By Lee West
Sam Allardyce is attempting to beat Sir Alex Ferguson at his own game today - after hiring a mind guru to fill his struggling Blackburn squad with positive thoughts.
United are on an 11-game Premier League winning streak and no one's put a league goal past keeper Edwin van der Sar since Arsenal won 2-1 at the Emirates on November 8 - 14 matches ago.
Allardyce employed sports psychologist Mike Forde at Bolton with huge success and is backing his new man - Jamil Qureshi, who worked with the 2006 Ryder Cupwinning team - to pull off similar results.
The Rovers boss said: "Everything you put in place today, particularly from a psychological point of view, plays a huge part in developing your players.
"Some players will want to see Jamil more than others, which is fine, while some might not want to bother.
"But those that speak to a professional as highlytrained as him will get some benefits from it.
"Football at this level is all about belief rather than ability - it's about positive attitude, building things up from a mental point of view.
"You need a strong mentality in the Premier League because, without that, you are found out."
Blackburn face being cast adrift in the bottom three if they fail to pick up at least a point against United.
And Allardyce admits that, despite United's title charge, tonight's game is far more important for Blackburn than for Ferguson's men.
He said: "This game is bigger for us because our livelihoods depend on it.
"Fergie can drop a couple of points and still win the league, but we need the points to stay up."
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