Time to reflect on a forgettable season
Thank Heavens, this forgettable season has finally drawn to a close. The limp defeat at Leicester was a timely reminder of that.
It was fairly obvious from the first whistle which team was fighting for survival and which had their minds on Prague and a certain fixture with Italian side Fiorentina.
As much as we all want to see West Ham leave the pitch after every game as the winning side, I suppose everyone on CandH would happily trade in a league defeat to Leicester against an actual trophy in a European final.
Selecting a starting XI for this one and making the right substitutions was always going to be a balancing act for our Supremo, what with the ECL final clearly taking priority in his decision-making process.
We actually had more than enough opportunities to draw the game…I am looking at you Mr Ings. But, overall we appeared to lack a sense of urgency and also we had little aerial threat upfront to stand much of a chance in the game.
However, Pablo Fornals got the only goal for the mighty Hammers and he has suddenly developed into our little Spanish talisman, scoring almost at will, so I wouldn’t bet against him starting for us in Prague…
It’ll be interesting to see how the West Ham hierarchy are going to analyse and compute all the shortcomings over the course of our Premier League season.
And how this is going to affect our summer transfer business. Is Scamacca going to return to Italy at the first opportunity ? Does Ings have a future here ? Will Cornet ever start a game?
We are in for an interesting summer !
I think from a recruitment perspective we have done well I.e. we gave brought in some really good players like Paqueta, Cornet, Aguerd and Scamacca but the big problem is that they play as individuals not as a team. Tge team is never set up correctly by Moyes to get the best out of these players so we can spend all the money in the world but if you dont have the right manager the return of that investment will never be fulfilled..
I’m not to fussed if Scamacca leaves or stays. If he does go, personally, I would like to include him in a deal for Abraham at Roma. Also, in my opinion, I haven’t been to impressed with Benrahma, Cornet or Ings. So would be looking to include them in deals for Jack Harrison, Harvey Barnes and Ward-Prowse. Benrahma is full of tricks and can run the length of the pitch doing some flashy foot work but is final cross / shot is terrible. Ings doesn’t seem to suit our system. He does try, granted but has missed some sitters recently. Cornet has had his injury problems this season, like Scamacca, but when he has come on I really haven’t been impressed. Nowhere near like his form at Burnley.
Have you not read/heard the managers comments he is delighted with the way the team played at Leicester!!! It is only the annoying fans that get upset with his tactics. I agree with Jonham1 it was a limp and pathetic performance against a now relegated team by a team expected to be top 10. Mibatch