West Ham manager David Moyes was spotted on Hackney Marshes over the weekend watching a game of Sunday league football.
The 57-year-old lives in a nearby Stratford hotel during the football season even though his family home remains in the seaside town of Lytham St Annes in Lancashire.
A club insider insisted the manager was just out for a stroll and was not scouting for West Ham from the Sunday league, he just loves watching football we were told.
The Hackney Marshes pitch complex was formed in 1946 with some rubble from the Blitz used as part of the sub-surface.
The Marshes are divided into north, south, east and west, and at its peak, in the 1950s and 60s, there were 120 full-size pitches bringing over 2,500 local footballers down to the area every Sunday morning. The number of football pitches was down to 106 by 1990 and there are 88 today, of which 60 are described as full-size adult pitches. There are 14 junior pitches, too.
Cue lots of comments/theories about the direction of travel of West Ham’s post-Covid player recruitment strategy.
It took less than 20 minutes from your comment!!
Having played for many years on the Marshes I can vouch for the talent that goes un spotted …Players like Cresswell and Noble could be replaced at a drop of the hat . Free transfers , Bosmans and out of contract has beens is all we can look forward to while the Brady bunch hold the purse strings .
Maybe he was looking for a centre back coupled with a left back and centre foward, because apparently that’s the type of player our buget will allow