Back to reality with a bump

It’s the West Ham Way to hold an unbeaten Chelsea, thrash Macclesfield 8-0 in the cup and beat Manchester United 3-1 four days later yet lose to an out of form Brighton the following week.

We all know the drill by now! West Ham build up your expectations to lull you into a false sense of security to believe they have turned a corner then knock you down with a killer punch to the stomach, twas ever thus. That is the life of a Hammer.

The first half against the Seagulls lacked intensity and passion almost if we believed that Brighton were there for the taking and we just needed to turn up.

Brighton had other ideas, they weren’t there to play football and they made it very difficult for us to play football either,  they sat back and tried to get us on the break.

Yarmolenko and Anderson were knocked off the ball too easily in the first half and Brighton’s 38 year-old  show defender showed up many of West Ham’s younger players.

Yarmolenko was partially to blame for Brighton’s goal but where were the centre-backs?   Marko Arnautovic looked out of form and the turning point for me in the game is when his impressive volley effort from a West Ham corner failed to go in. It wasn’t going to be our evening!

Arnie appeared to be limping later on and I am not sure he is fully fit despite what Pellegrini says about him.

I had a bad feeling about this game before kick-off which I put down as nothing more than a gut feeling.  Brighton is our new bogey team to replace Everton and Murray is our new bogey player to replace Lukuku.

We could have ended up in tenth place in the Premier League with a 2-0 win but we slip to 15th place behind Palace as Brighton leapfrog us to twelfth spot.

Southampton and Fulham both two points behind use have yet to play so could yet push us down to 17th place before the international break begins.