Amongst thousands of other supporters, commentators and pundits, I have not been slow to criticise Julen Lopetegui for his hesitancy to deploy some of the riches we acquired during the Sumer transfer window: In particular, Jean-Clair Todibo was the subject of an earlier article of mine seeing as he is supposed to be a high quality defender yet he cannot get a start.
Mavropanos seems to be the first choice to partner Kilman even with his error-strewn displays so far.
It seems the answer to my – and many thousands of fans- concern is already out there and we saw the 100% justification of our head coach’s strategy at the weekend.
So, frustrated that Todibo still waits for a full-time squad berth, Soler only came on for 20 minutes (more on him shortly) and Luis Guilherme can’t even get onto the bench, I took to looking back through Julen Lopetegui’s words regarding bringing foreign players into the Premier League. In a report by the Telegraph The Hammers’ head coach described his worries for new recruits from outside the Premier League:
“For the players, it’s sometimes not easy to adapt to this pace or this rhythm, this demand. They need time to understand what happens around them. That’s why we try to help them.”
This back before Carlos Soler’s debut against Fulham which -so nearly- ended up in him receiving two yellow cards on debut. It was clear he was half a yard behind the pace – exactly as Lopetegui had warned in his earlier interview.
In fairness, Todibo had also looked sluggish when he played a first half debut before being substituted and Rodriguez’ first outing saw me just use one word: ‘”S-L-O-W”.
Todibo, like other foreign recruits, needs time to get upto PL speed
Lopetegui clearly understands the extra rigours and pace of the PL in a way that perhaps we armchair (or desktop) critics forget, watching week-in, week-out: There is a long acclimatisation process required for non-Premier League recruits to adapt whereas others like Aaron Wan Bissaka are able to go straight into the team.
Having Seen how close Soler came to disaster in his 20 minutes, I need to be a little more forgiving if Lopetegui shields his new signings until they’ve had long enough to acclimatise.
I get it, it is so much more important to protect the fragile introverted personalities of incoming experienced world class footballers purchased at a cost of tens of millions of pounds, than to risk a psychological meltdown resulting from them not being able to replicate the lightning reflexes, athleticism and thought processes of those they were bought to replace. I have to wonder how M.City, United, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea etc. manage to successfully deploy new foreign signings before the ink has dried on their contracts?
It is the oldest trick in the book to go on the defensive and criticise the critics for being overzealous or mean spirited when you have no substantial argument to come back with against what is often just a common sense question.
Brilliant 👏
Bang on there Ray 👍
I honestly think that once Fullkrug is fit again, we may not see Antonio start again.
If even Ings can score in a ten minute cameo, Mikey has to brace himself for the eventual realisation that being a a big strong bloke simply isn’t enough. In fact Danny Ings might be a much better fit for Klopetegui’s model than either of the others as he feeds off chances in the box from other players instead of being a target man.
Ever seen Antonio score a one-on-one against a keeper?
Nope, me neither…
“Klopetegui”? Do you see him in the mould of Jurgen Klopp?
Made me laugh. I hope it wasn’t a typo😂
What’s his reason for not starting Summerville then?
And yet there are so many ex players and managers that say training can’t replicate real game time. What’s a fan to think?
Fans on every West Ham site gave their opinions on the starting lineup for Fulham well before kickoff. We certainly got what we wanted to start the second half and there was a big improvement. But hey we’re only fans, what are we to think?
That’s why he is the coach… and not one of us fans. He has a wealth of knowledge and experience and therefore we will just have trust his way of handling the players. Didn’t Moyes have a similar philosophy regarding new players to the EPL?
Hopefully these class players get up to speed quickly and we start seeing a good Hammers team.
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