It is often the case that we report on up and coming opponents having weakened sides to play West Ham who then proceed to give the Irons a good pasting.
In this instance, reports do suggest that the weekend’s opponents Burnley will have their work cut out to match the Hammers – who are likely to head into the game with just the one absentee.
West Ham’s Jean Clair Todibo is likely to be the only West Ham first team player absent, having to serve his ban for violent conduct sustained in the crazy past minutes against Chelsea.
From the videos emerging this week it will be a very fortunate Adama Traore and Konstantinos Mavropanos who climb aboard the coach for the trip to Turf Moor, both looking highly culpable in the west London fracas.
West Ham’s opponents on Saturday, according to Clarets fan site Burnleyexpress.net, aren’t so fortunate.
Former West Ham academy graduate Josh Cullen (main pic) is facing many months out with a nasty ACL injury and is joined by five squad members who are either sidelined or suspended. Burnley’s full list of ‘missing’ players is:
Zeki Amdouni, Jordan Beyer, Josh Cullen, Connor Roberts, Mike Tresor, plus of course ineligible Hammers loanee James Ward Prowse means Scott Parker’s side that were beaten 3-0 by Sunderland last night will have have limited options compared to the Hammers.
Similarly no midweek game for West Ham gives them longer on the training pitch in preparation and an opportunity to arrive fresh and fully fit against a team who played four days earlier.
However it will largely come down to ‘who wants it most’. Which is a teeny bit scary for West Ham fans.
However the Irons’ first half performance against Chelsea plus the three wins on the spin beforehand has to give the Hammers confidence, knowing also that Burnley haven’t won in fifteen games.
We have to win this game if we blow it again we will be relegated for sure! We can’t keep messing up!
Fortunately Bowen had already been subbed off otherwise he would have got blame
for not stepping in when the disagreement started.
Apparently we’ve thrown away 15pts on should have won matches.
This hurts even more looking at league table.
20 + 15 would total 35pts and put us in with clubs that may be challenging for Europe.
Providing they don’t incurr any injuries they might just stay out of relegation.
Nuno needs to think back on all the mistakes he’s made whilst at whu.
Could say same about Sully not sure his old senile brain would go back that far.
Simply put, if we do anything other than win, we go down. I believe 40 points will be required for survival. We have 14 games to go, and from those games 5 are against top 6 teams. It doesn’t leave much of a margin for error. There are maybe 4 games out of the 14 that we should, on paper, be winning, and this is certainly one of them. I can’t believe it has come to this.
I’m not too mad about the Chelsea game, they have arguably the best “squad” in the league. They bought on 265 million quid’s worth of subs against us, and that included a home-grown player. They had almost a billion quid’s worth of players in their match day squad. Our subs, Kilman (who shouldn’t have been brought on) aside, cost a whopping 2 million quid. How this gets by PSR I don’t know.
It’s been the matches like Leeds, Forest, and Wolves that have done this to us. “Must win” games to get us out of trouble that we have completely bottled. If we bottle this, we have to address leadership on and off the field.
As I have commented several times before, if you have a team that can’t win, if you have several first team players absent, if you have a striker who can’t score , if you have a team that can’t keep a clean sheet ; then there is one obvious solution to your deficiencies – play West Ham. However, I have a recent history of poor predictions; & I am hoping that this is another one of them !
We need every break we can get.
We were indeed lucky, Adama started that dust up and Mavropanos could quite readily have been sent off as well as Todibo.
The only teams we’ve caught up with by more than a point in the last six games are Palace and Tottenham and Palace just spent a fortune. We must beat Burnley…
Don’t worry. Wolves hadn’t won all season. Then we rolled over . Burnleys survival starts Saturday
So, how about if we go 3-0 up. Can we hold on to that?
If somebody locks Nuno in the toilet at half-time we can!
That made me laugh, and we could all do with a few more smiles!
Brilliant strategy 😂