7 Comments

The honeymoon period’s over Pelle – we need more!

By Sean Whetstone

The honeymoon period is now well and truly over for Manuel Pellegrini and he should not be exempt from criticism.

He is a world class manager reportedly earning £10m per year at West Ham; he spent over £100m in the summer but I was expecting much more by now.

His team seriously lacks consistency;  we still leak too many goals and lack regular clean sheets; we lack creativity in midfield and are not scoring enough goals given the talent in which we have invested. We look complacent at times against teams like Brighton and Huddersfield. It needs to improve!

It is true that we have suffered lots of injuries but isn’t that the case of every West Ham team and is nothing new for the Hammers. We were promised a step change with Pellegrini but as yet I am still waiting to feel it.

I am not suggesting that the board replace him but he should not be immune from criticism or pressure in delivering on the job he was bought in to do.

 

About Sean Whetstone

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 MooreThanJustaPodcast.co.uk. A Blogger on WestHamTillIdie.com 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

7 comments on “The honeymoon period’s over Pelle – we need more!

  1. We should not start giving Pellegrini unnecessary criticism while the job of turning around our results is still in progress. I said before the season started that it would take at least 10 prem games before we start to see results, and although we are now 12 games into the season, a lot has changed and we are still on-course for a radical change.
    People should remember the terrible state of our squad last season. If Pellegrini had to work with the squad Moyes inherited, we would have been relegated. Re-building the squad so rapidly fixed a lot but brought problems of its own. Injuries to the likes of Lanzini, Wilshere, Yarmolenko and Reid only put a brake on the progress.
    If we can get these players back ( especially Lanzini ) very soon, we could still see a successful end of season. If I had some spare money, I would bet some on us to get to the cup final.
    Work is still in progress, so lets not go back to crying and rattle throwing.

    • I certainly don’t think we would have been relegated this season with that squad. So what you’re saying is Moyes could keep us up and pellegrini couldn’t. So why did we chnage manager?

      • Because they knew they were going to spend over £100 million, of course, and David Sullivan wanted his favorite manager to spend it.

  2. Obviously we don’t have the money or class of players to challenge around the top 5 or 6. We all know that. The Olympic stadium isnt going to change that. It might if new owners are found but then you’ve got the FFP. I think if things click with the players we could get 7 or 8 th like under Slaven Bilic’s first season. That was a great season. Normally though we are mid table and very much up and down. We have some good players, but the very best players which we don’t have are consistent every week. Is mid table so bad? A good cup run? Pellegrini isn’t a miracle worker and we shouldn’t expect him to be that.

  3. I think (supporting Sean’s post) that we need to take a balanced view – there is a position between Pelle being a world beater and him needing to be fired

    With Snoddgrass being suspended for the next game vs Man Citeh we shoudl probably play with Nobes, Rice and Obiang in midfield and try to keep it tight like we did against Chelsea

    I felt that yesterday Diangana was muscled off the ball so would play Antonio for his greater strength and use Diangana as a sub

    Anyway the depressing thing for English football is that despite Man U’s bad start to the season it is rapidly turning into the top 6 vs the rest. I am not sure what it will take to break into the top 6 – so is “the next level” finishing 7th or 8th and managing to cope with the Europa League the following season (I see that currently Burnley who finished 7th las season are at even money to be relegated on Sky Bet)

  4. It’s just going to fizzle out in to another less than average season again…we have no consistency at all ..we talk all this big things but at the end of the day we couldn’t even beat Huddersfield….

  5. Pellegrini has had just 12 games, during which he’s had to endure a number of injuries to a squad from which he’s often had to juggle the remaining personnel to put out a starting Xi. I have to mention the number of new faces that have needed to find their feet in the Premier League as well. Criticism and pressure to deliver is not what Pellegrini needs, Sean…… you especially need to be patient over the next dozen games which will see players returning from long term injuries, and – dare I say it – an easier run of fixtures, post Man City next time out. Can I remind you that West Ham had to play Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea, Man United and Spurs in the first NINE matches?

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