The West Ham struggle for survival is all over bar the shouting and left to rivals Spurs to administer the coup de grace tonight. The sight of a dispirited club captain Jarrod Bowen trudging wearily off the St James’ Park pitch on Sunday summed up how every fan was feeling.
Few Hammers supporters will watch the Tottenham v Chelsea game with any sort of enthusiasm: Even if the Blues beat our north London rivals tonight, the Spuds have another chance against Everton to grab the one solitary point they need to relegate our defeated and dispirited side.
And then the problems really begin. No director of football or head of recruitment, West Ham have just an acting CEO (following Brady’s sudden departure) along with 78 year old David Sullivan to prepare the club for the enormous challenge of selling most of the top talent and recruiting in sufficient numbers to avoid starting the Championship campaign with a team of academy players.
And according to our source who is close to many of the players but outside of the club, there’s another burning, urgent problem to deal with come Monday morning as life in the Championship becomes brutally real.
After yesterday’s suggestion from Guardian journalist Jacob Steinberg, we put the question to our source regarding Nuno’s future that many readers had asked us: Will Manager Nuno Espírito Santo remain at West Ham after relegation?
“Gone. One million per cent“.
Which begs the question: Who will Sullivan pick to lead the West Ham circus into the Championship season?
It’ll doubtless be a ‘free’ manager who doesn’t have a job right now. As usual. So there’s little expectation that the Chairman’s pick for next season will be any more inspiring than his last three. Lopetegui, Potter and Nuno each in their own way contributed to West Ham’s top tier demise: Surely the board will stumble upon a half-decent Manager next time around? Don’t bank on it.
Slaven Bilic and Scott Parker spring to mind as the best of a bad bunch: Neither would presumably be deterred by working for the league’s worst and least popular football club owners.
Both would seem eminently capable of overseeing a rebuild on a shoestring but neither will set fans’ pulses racing ahead of what is likely to be a long, painful summer for all.
Parker will do nothing in the EPL but he knows how to get a side out of the Championship.
Right now it’s not about the long term it’s about ensuring we don’t slump further into Division 1.
I trot out the name Lee Carsely because he would be good with Academy players and when in charge of England team was not overly defensive, more in tune with attacking football which we see. Also, would be affordable which is part of the deal with WHU. No club management in the past though, so would be essential to have a DOF to shield him and allow him to concentrate on what he is good at and primarily there for.
There is Jemez of course.
Or, by the same criteria, for the most entitled, whining set of fans…