Pardew will wait for his big chance

Having parted company with Roeder, the next big challenge was to find his replacement.

The club received 57 applications for the job and that was duly whittled down to a manageable shortlist.

Brown and his directors felt they needed a man with some experience of the Nationwide League and names such as Iain Dowie, Gary Megson, Steve Coppell and Paul Hart were soon catching the attention of bookmakers.

Reading manager Alan Pardew was also a prime candidate. The 42-year-old has steadily built an impressive reputation as one of the English game's brightest managerial prospects and the statistics tell us his record since he succeeded Tommy Burns in October 1999 is excellent and he has gained 213 from a possible 359 points.

A week ago today, West Ham sought permission to talk to Pardew but Madejski turned them down via a statement on the club's website.

A second request was also rejected on Monday, as was Pardew's official letter of resignation two days later.

Since then the matter has turned messy, with the League Managers ' Association becoming involved and a possibility of a Football League investigation. Reading say compensation is not the issue.

They just don't believe allowing the best manager in the First Division to move to a potential rival is the most sensible thing to do.

For the time being, things have reached an impasse which, in view of the fact the two clubs play each other at Upton Park tomorrow, is probably no bad thing.

As a player at Crystal Palace and Charlton, Pardew was quietly efficient and he has shown the same qualities during his time in management.

He is also an ambitious man who has a vision, one day, of managing Barcelona or one of the other European giants.

For the moment, though, it seems that he remains keen for the opportunity to move to the more prosaic locality of East London.

If he remains of that mind, despite talk of codes of conduct, investigations and lawyers, he will surely get his chance, as did Steve Bruce following his acrimonious departure from Crystal Palace to Birmingham.

In the meantime, caretaker boss Brooking will be looking to extend his unbeaten run to six matches tomorrow while Pardew sensibly goes to ground and waits for developments.

West Ham, for their part, still have that shortlist and obviously can't wait forever.

Something has to give and logic says it will be Reading, who must be understandably miffed at Pardew's resignation after providing the launchpad for career.

Someone who knows Pardew well recently described him as "the new Alan Curbishley".

Lavish praise indeed but the man himself would probably prefer to be called just plain Alan Pardew.