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Media tide turns on owners

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The losses against Leicester City and West Brom this week has seen a number of prominent media people to join in criticism against the West Ham board.

Sun columnist Mark Irwin penned a scratching article in the printed version of the Sun last week calling the owners “jazz mag moguls” adding ” it is probably a good job the supporters are now so far from the pitch that they cannot see exactly how bad the football has become.”

Sun reporter Duncan Wright joined in over the weekend by saying “Alarming how a Premier League club can quite get itself into a mess in terms of completely unbalanced and inadequate squad as West Ham. Serious lack of identity and vision. And you just know they are making it up on the hoof ahead of deadline day too.”

On Sky’s Sunday Supplement programme Guardian Journalist Jonathan Liew said “It’s a Premier League club in London and generates huge amounts of cash and it is being run like a fruit stall” while Daily Telegraph sports writer Matt Law said there was a complete lack of investment in infrastructure saying “It’s just a shambles, an absolute shambles” 

Tony Cascarino told TalkSport listeners “A lot is wrong upstairs at West Ham, I am not a fan of the owners and there’s a lot going on”

The Daily Mail’s chief sports writer Oliver Holt said “Is it not even vaguely puzzling that Karren Brady is held up as a paragon of business savvy and yet she runs a club that is a total car crash”

Journalist Seb Stafford-Bloor from 442 said: “It’s increasingly clear: West Ham are a club drifting towards disaster” later adding “On West Ham. We’re urged not to talk about soul and culture, but those who disrespect those commodities tend to be punished for doing so.”

BT sport pundit and two time Hammer Joe Cole added more fuel to the fire saying “You feel the frustration from West Ham fans, they are not a hard bunch to please. They want players who fight, who graft but there also want a little bit of flair. West Ham have not won anything for thirty years. David Moyes hasn’t got pressure on him to win the FA Cup but fans want to see a team that is pulling in the right direction.  I think the problem lays more with the owners and the board in the eyes of the fans. There is a counter-argument that actually spent  money, they have not just spent it wisely”

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I am Season Ticket Holder in West stand lower at the London Stadium and before that, I used to stand in the Sir Trevor Brooking Lower Row R seat 159 in the Boleyn Ground and in the Eighties I stood on the terraces of the old South Bank. I am a presenter on the West Ham Podcast called Moore Than Just a Podcast A Blogger on West Ham Till I die a member of the West Ham Supporters Advisory Board (SAB), Founder of a Youtube channel called Mr West Ham Football at http://www.youtube.com/MrWestHamFootball,

I am also the associate editor here at Claret and Hugh.

Life Long singer of bubbles! Come on you Irons!

Follow me at @Westhamfootball on twitter

13 comments

  • In a nutshell :
    ” WE’RE NOT WEST HAM ANYMORE ” !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • Pellegrini’s Plonkers says:

    And it’s about bloody time too. You can only take people for fools for so long until eventually the truth comes out. How ironic for GSB that despite their recent self congratulations in the media before the Everton game, the same media is now turning on them and exposing their lies and rot within the club. I’ve been a fan for 46 years and I’m heartbroken at what’s happening to our club, our identity and our West Ham family.

  • Mitchell Burack says:

    I have been saying for years and years to myself that the issues at our beloved club go way deeper than just manager and player based ones.

    Yes, there is most definitely an element of player issues in that I assume the dressing room is filled with cliques and a self-assumes hierarchy based on the fact that we have a select number of players with enormous (in WH terms) transfer fees and wages behind them in comparison to the rest of the squad. Sadly, their fee and wages do not result in them performing better than other players in the squad who do not have the same calibre of fee and wages behind them but work significantly harder on the pitch – E.g. Comparing the work rate of Anderson to Rice.

    We’ve not had the right manager in place for years, and whilst that might be the fault of any manager we have not being able to adapt to the needs of the club, it really does boil down to the poor choices from the board and those who make the manager hiring decisions.

    Let’s look at Everton as an example. They were in trouble and paid a crazy amount of money to bring in Carlo A, someone I’ve always touted as a typical ‘top 4 in every league roundabout manager’. He now finds himself at a club like Everton who don’t fit that bill but for what it’s worth their investment seems to be really paying off as their performances under him have been miles better than before his arrival.

    Now look at us… We pay top bill for Manuel P, he does ‘ok’ in his first season but nothing special. He then gets the sack and we bring back in a manager who again, did ‘ok’ with us in his first stint. NEED I REMIND everyone that Moyes was in charge when we had that abhorrent revolt at the LS when losing 0-3 to Burnley… Why on earth would the board see it fit to reinstall someone at the club who has that in their history remit?

    Why… are we not paying top dollar to at least TRY and entice someone like Rafa B to the club. Yes he’s in China where the money is beyond beyond ridiculous but he really is the man we need. You only need to look at what he did with a Newcastle squad and side who were having a torrid time under Mike Ashley’s ownership with subzero investment to realise that he is a top quality manager and we would be privileged to have him at the club. Considering the money the David’s DO invest (although largely poorly), I really can’t see how it wouldn’t be a win win for someone like him to steer our club.

    Like I said earlier, the problems at this club are entirely at executive level and this season really will be breaking point. Either suck up your failures and make big changes or please please please put our club up for sale and sell it to people who will effectively own, run and invest in our special and beloved football club.

  • Whammer1 says:

    And BFS article puts my belief that Jordan Hugill was not a David Moyes signing but a Sullivan insurance policy signing should we had dropped.,as Arnie Chich ect would have been on their toes sharply. .out the mire Defoeesque

  • Peter bendall says:

    Can’t believe it has taken so long for people to realise that the owners are both clueless and classless . They only want to feather their own appulent porn palaces. Sullivan thinks he is big time player because “names ” get associated to the Hammers . The truth is that they have no intention of buying anyone . Moyes is a puppet and the squad is so poor that we cannot possibly survive .

  • billy says:

    THIS TRANSFER POLICY SHOWS THAT ” MOYES ” GETS ABSOLUTLEY NO SAY IN THE PLAYERS THAT COME IN , THE OWNERS DECIDE WHO COMES IN .AND WHAT A BLOODY MESS THEY ARE MAKING OF IT ;;

  • Hammer_Rite says:

    https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2010/jan/20/west-ham-david-sullivan-gold
    I still haven’t had this post published even though i wrote it yesterday for the article “protests against the board.It was about whether the board actually promised champions league football or not.
    My question to hugh and sean is why does it take so long for posts to be published and why do you not put the latest posts at the top of the page like most forums do and not down the bottom of the page.?If you put a comment on a older post i doubt if they anyone reads them.
    The other thing as well why can’t you preview or edit your post.
    You are my first goto west ham forum but i think these issues need to be looked at.

    • Mr Sean Whetstone says:

      The reason it takes so long is the moderators have full time jobs too so it takes time.

  • westhamsteve says:

    The owners are continually showing the fans exactly how they feel about our club.Indifferent and couldn’t care less.Every other club now knows that West Ham are in desperate trouble for players and with 4 days left in the window they are asking inflated prices for their players.And yet the owners still underbid for them.I feel sorry for Moyes as I’m sure he didn’t agree to this.If we make one signing in this window I’ll be shocked.

  • simon says:

    It seems that the spin is simply unravelling and people are beginning to perceive the realities at the club.

    If what Allardyce says there is true then it simply confirms what many have suspected, namely that Sullivan treats the club as a vanity project, hence the absence of infrastructure and simple professionalism in the way the club is run.

    You would have thought that after 25 or more largely unsuccessful years of football club ownership, overseeing numerous relegations and fan protests, it would have dawned on a presumably clever individual that they had no talent for running a football club or picking players.

    God forbid that this attitude and approach is perpetuated through Sullivan Jnr.

  • Jerry Birch says:

    About time too. The truth will set you you free mate. It’s clear that this site needs the status quo to remain for their vacuous non stories, club propaganda and click bait to continue to make them money. Sad. The tide has turned ⚒

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