by Allen Cummings
The odds on West Ham getting anything from Sunday’s visit to Stamford Bridge before last weekend would have been pretty slim at best.
But the manner of our victory over Southampton, the boost those three priceless points have given us all, supporters and players alike, combined with totally the opposite atmosphere in west London at the moment, after their shattering home defeat by Tottenham, has the potential to put a very different complexion on the upcoming game.
This could be the ideal opportunity for us to capitalise on the situation.
The spirit in the West Ham camp is sure to be high. They know they took a huge step to Premier League safety at the London Stadium and the game plan obviously worked a treat. Three goals, two for talisman Marko Arnautovic, coupled with a rare clean sheet, was perfect. The lift for players and fans alike was massive. Chelsea meanwhile suffered their first home league defeat to Tottenham in 28 years. That after going a goal up.
The defeat left them eight points behind their north London rivals and virtually ended any chance they had of finishing fourth ahead of the spuds and securing a Champions League place for next season. That will be extremely difficult for Abramovich and everyone else at the club to swallow.
There’s also the growing unrest around Conte himself, fuelled by the manager actually coming out and admitting Chelsea’s development was several years behind that of Spurs. That’s not the sort of thing the Stamford Bridge hierarchy or supporters want to hear. Not publicly anyway.
There’s also the the Italian’s frequent complaints about under-investment in the team. It’s all added to what appears to be a very volatile and unhappy ship! One that is rumoured to be putting the manager’s job very much on the line as well as weighing heavily on the future of several big players at the club with a mass exodos being predicted.
With so much unrest in the air there may not be a better time for us to take a trip down the Kings Road. Scoring the first goal last Saturday was massive for us. Getting the first goal again on Sunday could be equally vital and game changing.
As we know all too well from personal experience, conceding first at home can be devastating. If we can grab the opener, the nervousness and dissatisfaction around the ground could eruptp! Losing the first goal doesn’t sit well with any supporters. Losing the first goal to bitter London rivals is even worse. If we could achieve that, we could be on our way to another big day.
We’ve already beaten Chelsea once this season. Three points that were very much against the odds based on form at the time. It was an early goal that day, Arnie’s strike on six minutes, that we defended with our lives.
A repeat of that performance and result will have our travelling fans blowing Bubbles, and the Chelsea faithful singing the ‘blues’!
Death of Ray Wilkins won’t have helped us though
I’m not sure that will count for much in terms of the Chelsea players – most of them won’t have played under him or known him that well, if at all – but it will certainly be a sad day for the supporters, and adds to the unpredictability of it all.