West Ham United co-owner David Gold has said that he accidentally 'favourited' a derogatory tweet asking manager Sam Allardyce to be sacked.

Earlier on Tuesday, a Hammers fan tweeted Gold: "Is today the day we get rid of BFS?? Fingers crossed."

Gold, however, has denied that he intentionally condoned the tweet.

He tweeted: "After a 33 hour flight from New Zealand, I was in my car scanning through my tweets and it seems I accidently 'favourited' one.

"I should clarify that I did not and would never, deliberately or intentionally, endorse a tweet that questions our manager's position. Lesson: don't use twitter when you're jet lagged!"

West Ham play Tottenham Hotspur on the opening day of the Premier League season.