British and Irish Lions coach Ian McGeechan, who led tours of Australia and South Africa, is rewarded with a knighthood and there is an MBE for the Formula One champion, Jenson Button.

McGeechan, 63, a former Scottish international before becoming national coach and winning a Grand Slam and Five Nations Championship title in 1990, is honoured for his contribution to sport.

Button, 29, the second consecutive British Formula One champion, was honoured along with the man who made his victory possible, Brawn GP team owner Ross Brawn, 55, who gets an OBE for more than 30 years of service to motorsport.

Other notable sporting recipients include Beth Tweddle, 24, (above right) from Burnley, who secured her reputation as Britain’s most successful gymnast by winning her second World Championships title in London this year. Erstwhile England football captain Jimmy Armfield, 74, who made a club record of 627 appearances for Blackpool as well as winning 43 England caps, 15 as captain between 1959 and 1966, is awarded a CBE. Now a journalist and commentator, he is honoured for his community work in Lancashire.

Claire Taylor, 34, the first woman to be named as one of Wisden’s cricketers of the year, is given an MBE after contributing to the England victory in the World Cup and World Twenty20 competitions this year.

Jason Roberts, 31, of Blackburn Rovers, receives an MBE after combining a successful football career with charity work to encourage young people in the UK and the Caribbean to play sport.

There are also MBEs for former England cricketer John Jameson, 68, six-times world champion marathon canoeist Anna Hemmings, 33, Scottish golfer Catriona Matthew, 40, and Derby County FC stalwart Gordon Guthrie.

New Year honours listIan McGeechanRugby unionJenson ButtonFormula OneBrawnMotor sportGymnasticsBeth TweddleWomen’s cricketBlackburn RoversCaroline Daviesguardian.co.uk

• Blackburn hope Allardyce will return to work on Monday
• Manager is set to undergo an angioplasty on Friday

Blackburn hope to have Sam Allardyce back at work on Monday following his heart surgery, the assistant manager Neil McDonald has confirmed. Allardyce missed his team’s 2-0 Premier League win at Bolton on Sunday and is also expected to miss tomorrow’s trip to Fulham and Saturday’s home game against Stoke.

Tests have revealed that the 55-year-old, who has complained of chest pains in recent weeks, requires an angioplasty, a procedure which involves inserting a stent to widen a narrowed coronary artery. The operation is scheduled for Friday, but McDonald is hopeful that Allardyce will be fit to return before the Carling Cup quarter-final against Chelsea.

“The procedure is on Friday and they are saying if everything goes according to plan then [he will be back] in the next couple of days,” McDonald said. “We are hoping he will be back for the Monday before the Chelsea game.

“He is a strong man. He does everything as he has to and if this week goes according to plan, with another result against Fulham, it will take all the stress out and he will come back quickly. When you are talking about the heart and an operation it’s always a concern, but I think he has been reassured that it is routine.”

McDonald has been in close contact with Allardyce and said the win over Bolton – Blackburn’s first away league victory this season – had lifted his spirits.

“I’m in touch with him on a regular basis and he’s very happy with Sunday’s performance and result, and I’m sure he’ll be looking for exactly the same on Wednesday,” said McDonald. “I could tell in his voice that he was happy. He didn’t watch the game from the start but he did afterwards and he really enjoyed it.

“He thought it was a little bit scrappy in the first half, but he thought we played well second half and thoroughly deserved the victory. That put a big smile on his face because it was against his ex-team.”

McDonald said Allardyce was never in any danger of underestimating the levels of stress in his job. “In pre-season he was in London getting himself checked out,” he added. “He is a person who knows about the stress; he has been in the job for a long time. He knows what the stresses and strains are and he looks after his body accordingly.

“That is why he has picked up on what has happened now, and done so early. If he didn’t look after himself, the consequences might have been worse.”

Sam AllardyceBlackburn Roversguardian.co.uk

• Blackburn manager claims his players lack mental toughness
• ‘Players are putting themselves up for being dropped’

Sam Allardyce launched a stinging attack on his Blackburn Rovers players after their “pathetic” second-half performance at Chelsea, claiming they lack the necessary mental toughness to pick up points away from Ewood Park and warning them that they are risking their future involvement in the first team.

The Lancashire club slipped to their ninth successive away defeat in the Premier League after shipping four goals in 16 shambolic second-half minutes. They have conceded 30 times in that sequence stretching back to mid-March, mustering only four goals in response, with Allardyce’s patience finally appearing to snap after the latest humiliation at Stamford Bridge.

“At the moment we’re simply not good enough, and that’s the bottom line,” he said. “In the Premiership the mental side is even more important than the ability side. You can only play in this league if you have that mental toughness and resilience. Ability comes after that. But, at the moment, the mental resilience is not there, and the physical challenge to the opposition is not there either.

“It’s not about the getting beat, it’s the way we are getting beat that concerns me most. If we’d have stuck to our guns and perhaps come off having lost this game 1-0, or if they scored at the end for 2-0, then you’ve got something to work on. But I’m back to square one again.

“They have to realise things are going to have to stop because they are going to lose their place in the team if they are not careful. They are putting themselves up for being dropped. We want them all saying: ‘You can’t drop me, I’ve got the shirt, someone else is going to have to take it off me, you have to fight for it.’ But it’s not difficult to change the team at the moment.”Rovers were denied a quartet of key players in west London, with David Dunn and Christopher Samba succumbing to a virus, Pascal Chimbonda injured and Franco di Santo ineligible against his parent club. Yet, despite Gael Givet putting through his own goal midway through the first period, Allardyce had not envisaged the second-half capitulation and will be concerned given their next away fixture is at Old Trafford on Saturday. “I never saw that coming,” he added. “What looked as if it was working well tactically in the first half completely went out of the window in the second half. I can’t understand the mentality of my players losing what I asked them to do.

“They’re listening because you saw what happened in the first half. What they are deciding when the game goes is: ‘We are 2-0 down, let’s forget about that and let’s go and try and score three.’ Well that’s a bit naive to say the least, at Stamford Bridge, isn’t it? Scoring one’s hard enough here. It was the old Jekyll and Hyde job We just opened ourselves up again and said: ‘Score as many as you want.’ We’ve got Manchester United away next week. I’m going to try to play with 13 there.”

Blackburn’s last nine Premier League away games

14 March Arsenal 0-4

11 April Liverpool 0-4

18 April Stoke City 0-1

2 May Manchester City 1-3

17 May Chelsea 0-2

22 August Sunderland 1-2

20 September Everton 0-3

4 October Arsenal 2-6

24 October Chelsea 0-5

31 October Manchester United

Blackburn RoversSam AllardycePremier LeagueDominic Fifieldguardian.co.uk