After the Man United Defeat Blind Hammer looks at the wider perspective
The Man United defeat pricked our bubbles. Still Moyes consistently warned that there would be bumps in this journey.
There remains a massive resource disparity between West Ham and most of our current lofty challengers. . Our second best player is a Manchester United reject who could not force his way into their first team.
The wider perspective is that, for once, we are over achieving. West Ham’s wage bill and turnover should, see us competing around 8th . The actual par may vary slightly because of the yo yoing relegation of clubs like Villa and Newcastle.
Happily both Leicester and West Ham are punching above their weight. West Ham are over achieving after decades, Payet season excepted, of under performing.
The Moyes project though has the opportunity to raise this par.
Some fans hoped for a sugar daddy investor ready to pour billions into West Ham to pump the club to a higher level.
More realistically raising our par means growing the club.
The good news is that one component of this project is there. Moyes is keenly aware of this.
Moyes’s old boss ,Bill Kenwright, , explained the relative Mersey-side decline of Everton.
In the mid 1980’s Liverpool won two championships, FA Cup as well as European Cup Winners Cup. Despite this Liverpool left them in their wake over succeeding seasons.
Kenwright blamed Liverpool’s greater Stadium capacity. He explained that In one game Liverpool’s extra 10,000 mattered little. But, he argued, over a season 20 games with 10,000 extra supporters starts to matter.
Over five years the advantage is big and over 10 years the difference is massive. Decades of relentless capacity advantage allowed Liverpool to grow compared to Everton, not just with increase gate receipts but more importantly vastly increased commercial revenues.
It is not simply the same 10,000 supporters arriving every week, but a much bigger number, some attending only occasionally but nevertheless becoming, often with their families, supporters for life.
A virtuous circle of success from these extra resources increased the competitive advantage still further. Liverpool could pay higher wages and transfer fees not just for one year, but every year.
So if Kenwright is right the extra capacity of the London Stadium matters. It provides Moyes with an opportunity to grow West Ham.
I am convinced Moyes knows that 66,000 supporters every fortnight over the next 10 years can, if things are put right, transform West Ham. Unlike Mourinho, Moyes will not be saddled with a £1 billion debt to service.
The key of course is performance on the pitch to break the self destructive negativity which has beset us in recent seasons. Moyes sensibly stresses the need to promise less and deliver more. Steady as she goes is the order of the day. Just winning more games than we lose it a realistic start. A start which could finally provide a brighter future.
David Griffith
Not sure if it was my misake or an edit but it was Everton who won 2 championships, FA cup and European Cup Winners in the mid 80s, hey days of Lineker etc. The point is that Liverpool went on to outperform them despite this success. Kenwright put this down to the greater capacity at Anfield which allowed them to grow a much bigger supporter base which eventually translate into a bigger international brand.
Great post BH, agree with you that it is a building project required and not sure if you feel the same but sustained investment at the same level over probably 10 or more seasons to consistently break into the top four, one thing I have observed is rather than playing two times a week being a hindrance it seems to make players sharper, probably from being more match fit, I suspect the shake up of the status quo has as much to do with that as no fans. If we have a manager that can consistently get us into the European places staying in Europe or other cup competitions should be viewed as a priority in keeping up our performance levels against those better teams. None of this playing the second team rubbish, play a team to win the games it will help us in the middle and long term.
Great piece David, very well written and reasoned.
Finance is key to sustainable development, we haven’t been great at selling on players too many times in my opinion, by that I mean achieving top market levels, for outbound sales, this alone has inhibited our ability to reinvest into our squad in a meaningful way.
Slow and steady process and progress is being espoused, even more so in these troublesome times.
I totally agree that we have more often than not performed below par, from memory I recall circa five, or six occasions this century when we achieved our expected level, excluding this one.
I’d be interested to hear from fellow Hammers on any opinions held of team positions that require upgrades (striker aside as that is glaringly obvious).
Interesting read David. It would be great if the gradual progress was allowed to continue and mature into a successful, trophy winning team. Trouble is that most people with an opinion will not settle for ten years of steady growth. Look at the disastrous decision of the Moyes crowd to play the way we did against Man Utd twice We were totally outplayed and out-thought by the superior opposition. We failed miserably. Embarrassing results. Though I seem to recall the FA Cup tie went to extra time. We lost 1:0 and could easily have come away winners with a little more luck. And the latest disaster was also 1:0. OG that might hva been ruled out. Our penalty not given. Arsenal got a penalty for falling over after an air-shot! We desperately need to accelerate our improvement to quickly attain our ambition. Allow billionaire owners to spend billions on a new manager and squad. If we can’t get Pellegrini back then we might look to the latest Pep. Bring the guy in. Bring in any staff he wants. Money no object. If that doesn’t work immediately, get Klopp. Same plan. OK maybe not Klopp – Liverpool aren’t doing too well just now. Or maybe easier if the opinioned KIAs supported Man City or whoever is ‘dominant team of the month’. That would leave the rest of us to enjoy watching our team grow in a natural organic way. Satisfaction all around. There may be downs as well as ups on our journey. We need to be realistic and enjoyment is key. No good thinking about our plan for 2031/32 until we sort out today. I think the men we have at the moment are doing a great job for today and will build for tomorrow in ways they can look back on with pride and satisfaction.
COYI