Through necessity, West Ham had an ‘interesting’ starting eleven – it was a challenge to see where the goals were going to come from. Soucek, Paqueta, Kudus and on occasion Edson Alvarez moved forward in the early minutes looking to attack Palace’s box. The clear problem from very early on was how West Ham were going to get up the pitch, being almost entirely reliant on Mohammed Kudus to be the outlet to move the side forwards.
Palace and West Ham both looked pretty ordinary up to the first half hour mark, the visitors having the better of the chances such that they were Apart from Wan-Bissaka’s wide effort, it looked for all the world like a David Moyes ‘park the bus’ escapade. A line of five at the back and three in midfield made for dour watching. Eze’s Rabona cross was about the only noteworthy point of the first half.
Sixty thousand plus people froze and dozed their way through that 45 minutes.

One Hammers’ chance in the half – Wan Bissaka not even close
Deep joy to see Carlos Soler come on for Rodriguez at half time: Any crumb of comfort.
Ironically the midfielder-shaped gap that was left by Rodriguez’ exit and Soler playing further forward, allowed Mateta unchallenged to take the ball and run on Kilman who just backed off.. and backed off. Not good enough.
One – nil. Ollie Scarles, Lewis Orford and Danny Ings readied. Paqueta, Cresswell and Emerson made way.
Kudus finally won a corner and a flurry of activity ended with – nothing. Very poor fare being served up for West Ham’s paying customers. How one dimensional the Hammers looked, without an Antonio-style target man to move them up the pitch. Safe to say that Kudus is not suited to the role and there seemed no outlet, not one goal chance in the whole of the second half.
Eddie Nketiah entered, ominously ‘looking for his first league goal’ as announced by the commentator. What odds in the next ten minutes? Prophetic words as Nketiah got through against Fabianski, who saved on a one-on one from the substitute immediately.
Straight after-Mavropanos got himself sent off- for a second yellow – for a high footed clumsy challenge 40 yards from goal: Pathetic.The Greek will miss a game now and that leaves the sum total of one fit central defender. West Ham down to ten men in a perilous position for the last ten minutes.
A one-nil loss would seem like a relief, to be honest. Eight more minutes of this masochistic ritual to endure. Guilherme thrown on by Potter – too little too late. Risks were now being taken in an effort to get something out of the game -which meant players popping up all over the place. wait a minute- Alvarez at number 10? This’ll end in tears. And it did.
From that risky pushing forward, leaving gaps, a breakaway from NKetiah and a one-on-one with the ‘keeper meant Fabianski took him down for a penalty. The Palace attacker was going wide of the post, why Fabianski took him down – who knows.
You’ll see later on MOTD and judge for yourself. Fabianski should have done better: 2-0 Crystal Palace and boos at London Stadium. The ground ’emptied like there was a fire drill’.
The honeymoon is over. West Ham have been exposed for what they really are: Toothless in attack. Devoid of midfield creativity. And Mavropanos – a mistake per game as always. Championship quality at best.
David Sullivan needs to face some truths. With these players on the pitch, it could have been Moyes, Lopetegui, Guardiola or Klopp, the result would have been the same.
your finest work to date, Mr. Treasure. i mean no folly when i say that this piece of literature truly tapped into the essence of my support for this fabulous but gut-wretching club.
i was on a lounge in my flat, awake at 2:30 A.M, and already sleep deprived. i felt ill and drained and like 2025 was already shaping up to be a more dire reality – for WH and myself – than was 2024! i live on the east coast of Oz, an hour south of Sydney. there is a football field around the corner and i get to train with the locals (i’m 58) and i can see the horizon and the oil tankers and cargo ships at night from my living room. what was i doing, watching this turgid depressing slop? i was certain during parts of that “match” that i honestly believed i could have done better myself in that situation. i’m sure many of our ilk have thought the same, and i wouldn’t doubt them. the only position i never played was CB (5′ 9″ and built like a pencil) but i know that i would never have done what Kilman did, guiding his opponent down the driveway to his own unwalled house. and i’ve been in that situation and survived it. again, my fellow readers may be nodding their heads (“i did that as well”). i still go the 90 minutes too, btw! but i didn’t have the energy to be angry with what i was seeing on the field. just a profound feeling of sickly deja vu – the “Burnley” game, relegation 2000, 2010, FA Cup loss ’05,Payet, Zaza. as footballers, watching….we deserve better than that.
i took a spl**f out onto the balcony, sat there and waited for the sun to go just over the crossbar and shine a ray of hope onto me. it’s certainly not happening vicariously, via a football team i somehow had attached myself.
touché, Monsieur Treasure ✌
thank you for those kind words- many will disagree !
I don’t think the Fulham game was a false dawn, the game was won off if two mistakes.
But from the Villa game onwards you can see more discipline in the squad.
Unlike under Loppy, they have shape, and they look more organised than at any time I’ve watched them play this season.
However, with 3 of our attacking line up out of action and the slow ponderous midfield GP has inherited, we offer nothing going forwards.
For a brief period after Marvo’s sending off and Palaces penalty, there were some better passages of play involving the subs. Younger, faster, more energetic players with points to prove.
It’s going to be a season of survival and rebuild.
If Loppy had been in charge of this game we would have gone in 4 or 5 down.
If Lopetegui watched the match he must have been snickering and asking “who are they going to blame now that I am not there?”
The truth of the matter is that we have a very mediocre squad. It would require a massive amount of money to improve it. As that will probably not happen, we are going to be candidates for relegation unless things change drastically.
IMHO – Lopetegui still holds some responsibility for the poor morale, confusion & dissatisfaction in the squad, not to mention the quality.
Plus Lopetegui enjoyed the lowest rate of injuries in the premier league which is no longer the case….
Can’t get injured if you don’t fight for the badge (or coach). Irony?
please no more Flappy or Cresswell too old & past it for the Premier League & why not start Soler 😉
Soucek / Alvarez/Rodri/ are all not good enough / too slow / defence especially the Greek pirate – poor ( except Wan) and keeper not quite good enough- with Ings ho can’t score ! Let’s play the youth – we must have a striker and central defenders in the academy . Doesn’t matter how old they are … they must watch it and despair 😉
A sad story as CP looked the better team all along. During the first half, CP had a couple opportunities, whereas WH had none. Actually the lack of an attack led to a passive version of West Ham today, exemplified by the rather invisible Soucek and Kilman when he just kept looking at Mateta for the 0-1. Up to the penalty, Fabianski had a good game. Kudus an ocasional bright light, but only intermittently. A pity Summerville was not available for this game. Potter still has a lot of work ahead of him.
We have no attacking players with pace. All injured! So that automatically stops the goal threat. We are then asked to play two sides on remarkably good form with a flaky defence. Palace are extremely organised and have only lost to Arsenal in their last 10 games, Fulham only to us in their last 10 games. So asking us to play two super confident teams; with no goal threat and a shaky back four was a hiding to nothing. This season is over – leave the lynch mob ranting and the complaints behind – just get behind the new manager. He is smart! He sees what we see, He thinks like we do. If he is given time and full support – he will come good.
Well said Thom
Fair points, all of them.
Both Palace & Fulham are top half teams (West Ham were lucky in both Fulham games and the 0-2 win at Selhurst.)
This season is about staying up and giving GP some funds to bring in some players.
Thom I certainly hope so and agree with you. Graham gave a very honest interview after the game and highlighted the need for improvements. It’s interesting to see that Palace were winless until the end of October but have improved under Glasner joined in February last year.
I do think that the players also need to step up and take more responsibility. Most are internationals yet we only had 3 shots on target against Fulham and zero shots on target today. This is unacceptable for any team particularly at Premiership level. Yes we have most of our strikers injured, but surely should still be creating more chances especially when we still have players such as Soler, Kudus and Paqueta.
Self discipline must be improved and Alvarez and Mavrapanos nearly led to us being down to 9 men. This happens far too often leading to suspensions and weakened sides letting down the manager and team.
I can only hope today’s defeat will force Sullivan to act quickly to back the new manager in the transfer market and bring in the players who Potter has identified to rebuild his team.
It’s quite simple they need to spend money ….its been obvious..no matter who’s in charge the dryad wasn’t good enough before we list bowen Antonio and unsettled duck note …so ifcwe need players then ..wouldn’t you say this is pretty desperate to get them in .
.the stats with shots on goal speak for themselves…we are so far behind 75% of the prem teams ….potter needs help NOW …sending 3 or was it 2 academy on is great ..but it was the only subs we had …so no choice…
We definitely need to get rid of “duck note” as he is a very lame duck! 😂
Awful performance, one of the worst in recent years. West Ham did not have a single effort on target all game and had only 14 touches in the opponents penalty box! Their keeper did not have to make a single save. We could easily have been down to 9 men as Alvarez walked a tightrope as he continued to argue with the referee while on a yellow, and Mavraponos stupidly got sent off after a second yellow and yet another suspension.
Someone please explain why Carlos Soler was on the sub’s bench after scoring against Fulham when we had no creative quality? Why one of our slowest players Soucek was left to try and run in behind their back 3 as we had no other attackers while Ings and Guilherme were on the bench?
What on earth was Fabianski doing bringing down Nketia concede the penalty when he was going wide of the post and Wan Bissaka could have dealt with the threat? Zero attacking threat and dreadful defending, with a squad which is completely unbalanced and badly lacking quality and depth. The only bright spot was seeing Ollie Scarles and Lewis Orford. I agree Martin the squad needs urgent investment. Thomas Tuchel must have wondered why he bothered coming to the game as thousands left early and West Ham got booed off.
Palace attacked the players quickly, but need to move the ball forward a lot quicker, far toooo many back passes. Tell players to look UP THE PITCH first, before going backwards, but a good win
Er… we didn’t win!
PS. Do you realise this is a West Ham fansite?
100% agree. Well said.
Spot on Martin. One of the worst displays of the season…and there are a few to choose from.
Clearly second best and two goals conceded again is the thing that needs to stop. Difficult to see anything other than a defeat at Villa on Sunday week with difficult games to follow that.
Judging by that performance we look like we need at least six new players. A goalkeeper, centre half, left back, two midfielders and please god, a striker. That would just be for starters. Going to be a long season where we’re looking down instead of up if this carries on.