THE headlines will no doubt be shrieking about West Ham throwing away a lead again, about the future of Nuno Espírito Santo and the ‘certainty’ of relegation after the Hammers contrived – along with some outside forces – to pluck defeat from the jaws of victory in a game in which, for large parts, they looked to be controlling.
The benefit – if you can call it that – of attending a game with a flat phone in my pocket was that there was no ‘outside’ influence – or confirmation bias – of reading anyone else’s options or thoughts- save the shouts and boo’s of 40,000 plus brave souls who, like me, gently shivered their way through that freezing cold east London night and then no doubt endured similar depressingly familiar (long) journeys home in the wet, dark unforgiving English winter.
Appropriate really. Dark and unforgiving. VAR personified.
For it was VAR that decided the outcome of that match and perhaps West Ham’s fate.
It was also VAR that robbed the supporters of their spectacle, of the moments of triumph or any single moment of clarity as first Summerville’s goal got disallowed, West Ham were denied a penalty and then ‘Forest received one: In seemingly a few moments the ‘score’ had gone from 2-0 to West Ham to 1-2 and like thousands of others, I felt short changed, unable to relate this to the game I used to follow so avidly and sad, more than anything, that ‘we’ as fans have let this mighty national sport become a contrived ‘entertainment event’ where the attending, paying public’s views and value for their £100 tickets are completely overlooked.
For the record, without any confirmation bias of reading other pundits’ more ‘informed’ opinions, West Ham looked halfway decent: Until Nuno inexplicably took off the guy who was starting to take control of the midfield, we looked good value to go on and win the game.
“Taty” looks a seasoned, astute striker who makes a big difference to the side: As for Pablo – let’s just say the first signs weren’t so favourable but too early to jump to any conclusions. The optimist inside me says WestHam. will still find a way to get themselves out of this mess once this group has a chance to train together. Laugh if you will at my unbridled optimism.
My enjoyment of the spectacle- thanks to VAR may have gone forever -but my faith in West Ham will never die.
And as for ‘fan protests’ – if someone wanted to start a world-wide fan protest to rid the sport of this curse that is VAR I’d get out and protest for that. But I fear that battle may have been lost already in the global commercialisation of so-called ‘top tier’ football.
And by the way. Who ‘boos’ their own team? That was probably the low point. Not that we lost. But the reaction of so called ‘West Ham fans’.
Martin now I clamed down I’ve looked at the two var decisions again, I am still wondering how a ref sitting there looking with all the tech at his disposal can make two such glaring mistakes. 1/ Summerville did not pass the ball for the offside it was taken off him by a tackle and therefore is not offside. 2/ there is a strong case to question who clattered into who for the penalty as both were in the air traveling towards each other as the ball came in. So VAR do not need to get involved at all as it is not a huge mistake by the ref on the pitch. The ref on VAR duty need re-educating or sacking. It has been a bit like this all season with one example pen against Pac Man for a rugby tackle but not for Soucek in the very next game. Seems to be a patten emerging here!
It also occurs to me that any canny side will now place one attacker who’s sole purpose is to jump towards the keepers’ hands, writhe around once hit and ‘win’ a penalty. Ridiculous.
I won’t laugh … but I will cry ! The question of VAR is very much a poisoned chalice; looking back to the time before VAR we all looked forward to technology which would put the disputes beyond doubt. Now that we have got it, we don’t like the decisions which are made using it. This is because , even with VAR in place, the decisions still come down to human perceptions & interpretation – so mistakes still occur. What can be done to ensure “error free decisions” ? Answer ? Very little; humans make mistakes in what they see & in the interpretations that they make about what they see. Quite simply, you simply have to hope that the decisions all fall in your favour – extremely unlikely ! Long standing laws have been changed to accommodate decision making based on the “interpretation of VAR; but that, in itself has not solved the problems of inconsistent decisions based on VAR. So, where are we at ? You simply have to grin, bare & accept the technology or, you go back to not using it ! One possible suggestion that I would like to toss into consideration is to remove the offside rule completely – no more offsides VAR or otherwise. What do people think ?
The technology involved in VAR is fine it’s the useless people who interpret it at Stockley park.Whenever the ref is sent over to the monitor you know what the outcome will be.why can’t refs have minds of their own when it comes to VAR.
I personally wouldn’t want to get rid of the offside law but just go back to the old law where it was black and white.All this grey area about saying whether a player is or not interfering with play is just confusing in itself.
That would mean you would have goal hangers and change the nature of the game.
How about having VAR as it is now, but after drawing the offside line as they do, they then draw a 2nd line which is the length say of an average arm’s length away from the 1st line and parallel.
Anything that does not exceed the 2nd line is not offside. The idea being an attacker on the shoulder of a defender cannot tell if he is offside by the 1st line. By which I mean Castellanos has no way of knowing his heel is offside but would be able to judge within an arm’s length whether he is still onside. Before VAR, linesman, defender and attacker could make a rough judgement within an arm’s length I would guess, whether onside or not – this would replicate that margin of human judgement.
Have not thought it through – sorry if sounds nuts.
Enjoy reading comments as well as the article. Great points of view.
Cheers!
Good article, agree with pretty much all of that, apart from Pablo, I think he showed some good signs.
Re VAR, couldn’t agree more. As I said last night, “VAR, robbing football fans of any joy, one review at a time”….. that and the tourists sat around me (most of them not even watching the game) has drained me of any enthusiasm to keep going.
Don’t understand VAR decisions since ball comes off Milenkovic and ball is already headed out by Soucek when Areola hits MGW – anyhow too late now.
Thought WHU played a decent game no more no less and we were better team (biased I know). Castellanos is what WHU have been missing for too long, he is more mobile than Wilson and a good link-up player, which is exactly what we need with ball players like Bowen, Paqueta,… hopefully Summerville will learn to pick him out. Also, seems NES can now play what I assume is his preferred 4-3-3.
NES corrected mistakes from previous game with best CB pairing and more experience in midfield. Unfortunately, after subs were made, team were completely rudderless. Should have kept Paqueta who was having a quietly effective game with no histrionics. Easy to criticise but hope manager works out how to add attacking pressure without simultaneously weakening midfield and they train till all are comfortable with it.
Just a remark, personally I like that he subbed Mayers for Scarles because I thought good idea to share the pressure between 2 youngsters who will gain in savviness as they play. Input from Robson?
Hope manager builds on this and does what players always say: take the positives forward and fix mistakes/errors. WHU have a mobile developing team with quite a bit of talent, who I think could play attractive, quick, effective football. If we can become harder to score against, WHU could make a good fist of it – with a good dose of luck😊. COYI
If those decisions were made against Forest you would see the other perspective. We had less control of the game than them, Summerville repeatedly runs into dead ends and loses the ball. We had ZERO shots on target in the second half and only went in front thanks to a slice of luck. We’re going down and this is on Sullivan and Brady, Kretinsky has to share the blame. No point in getting rid of Nuno, as no one could save us from here, although that was probably true when he came in. PLAN FOR THE CHAMPIONSHIP NOW.
Very true on all accounts. If we can can find some solid defenders with Leadership and grit, we maybe able to save the season.
Forever Westham
Hi Martin
Agree with most of that .. But let’s look at the brighter side .
A season without VAR Gary Neville & Jamie Carragher & sky’s obsession with Man utd & Liverpool won’t ne missed
COYI
Steve B
Also Steve four more home games.
I am trying to be positive but it doesn’t come easy
I know we want to talk about the possibility of staying up… However Forest hit the bar ..Areola pulled off a worldy…If either of them went in then VAR and offside decisions would be academic…We are done…I hate to admit it…And I want to hope we have something in our locker going forward….It seems they are buying the players that Nuno wants…That tells us he is staying…. Good….We need an identity…We need purpose…When we go down we are going to need a style and togetherness to get back straight away…. Remember this …Nuno didn’t relegate us.
Fully agree with VAR comments on here, its sucked the life out of the game. You cannot fully celebrate goals fully as there is VAR for what seems most goals.
Sadly I will not be renewing my and son’s season tickets as we are now effectively down! Its an expensive hobby and I go back to 1962 when we bought Budgie Byrne for a British record fee £65,000! I know inflation has intervened but £40 million for two so so strikers is ludicrous!
At least Championship does not have VAR.
Until referees are punished for bias decisions nothing will change West Ham should insist that neither the referee or VAR official are ever allowed to referee a West Ham match again Other clubs have done it so why shouldn’t we
Agree with everyone’s comments, VAR a shambles, actually looking for faults instead of protecting actual infringements, always seems to be the teams playing well and don’t need the luck get it, and the teams struggling get no luck at all, thought there was a lot more battle last night, but what has worried me for years is that we are the only team in any division I have watched that don’t close teams down, more goals are scored by teams trying play out from the back, but we just let them, and at the other end instead of closing shots down we just retreat deeper into the penalty area and invite crosses and shots, I don’t care if we lose as long as we put in a fight and some tackles, for years we just roll over pathetically.
Sometimes the problem is just a lack of quality in the squad whoever the manager – BFS failed at West Brom and Moyes failed at Sunderland
We have needed a centre back leader since Zouma’s knees gave in during Moyes last season
It looks like we will be relegated whether or not we replace Nuno – but our own great escape (following a 6-0 thrashing by Reading) and Leicester’s escape under Nigel Pearson the year before they won the league show that it’s not impossible – but currently very unlikely
COYI
It is difficult to see how it is possible to avoid relegation now – I have been clutching at straws for a while – feeling that it may be possible to win the next game and so on – the fact that we have only taken one point from the last four games makes us the most out of form side and if this goes on – we may well finish bottom – it was noticeable that Taty chased down everything in the first half and then stopped doing it in the second – Areola really only made the one mistake – trying to do something that doesn’t come natural to him and was the busier keeper – poor management from the top and allowing so many heart on the sleeve players to leave the club at the same time – we are in desperate need of a strong leader on the field and to get some identity back within the team – recruiting younger players in the summer was a step in the right direction but we missed the chance to bring in some experience to help them- Big Sam said that he would only sign players in January that can make an immediate difference and hit the ground running – not sure the two new forwards tick this box (as no previous championship or premiership football experience) but happy to be proved wrong!! Feeling gutted this morning!
I also hate VAR, but I don’t blame it for our predicament. It cuts both ways. The truth is, if you drop deeper and deeper, because you don’t have a winning mentality and you are incapable of keeping the ball, you’re going to invite pressure. That means loads of balls into your 6-yard box. Once that happens, the chances of goals, own goals and penalties increase massively. We’ve seen it continuously since Moyes. It was he who drummed that ridiculous mindset into the players of, “you don’t need the ball” and “lets’s not lose”, rather than “this is our to win”.
The displacement of simple passes, especially in the final third was almost criminal.
No, we’re in this mess because that’s who we are. I’ve supported this club for over 60 years. It’s never been any different. Even in the few good times, there was always a belief that it was a holiday from the dire, rather than the start of a new dawn of belief
You’ve summed up how I feel about football at the moment. I rarely watch it on TV (I did last night as I’m ill). I go to watch football, I buy a ticket to support my team and hopefully be entertained. I do this at times that are inconvenient to me, partially my fault as I live in rural Essex but getting home at midnight to accomodate TV viewers is a bit of a ball ache. Like you, I’ve felt short changed and unable to relae to the game for a while now. Poor use of technology is rife in our modern world, as exemplified by VAR.
I thought generally we looke dokay last night, Taty can run, which is a bit of a result for us. VAR and the refereeing standards are killing it for me. How the referee can ignore the foul on Summerville and then give a penalty against Ariola, I’m confused by. If Souchek misses the ball Ariola punches it, what would they do then?
I also don’t undrstand why people boo their own team, it doesn’t add any value, why would you do that?
you get home as early as midnight? I wish..
I didn’t like to say 00:30 as my wife may spot it and not let me out to play!
yup, ditto… 4 hours travelling for 2 hours freezing and draining footy… maybe I’m just getting old!
I’m sorry but Forest pressed and attacked more , the writing was on the wall.The excuses need to stop
Peters is not the right build to defend corners in the box. We need to play on the ground. The biggest mistake is just clearing the ball to the opposition. We are slow when going forward too many times
Paqueta always looks to make a successful pass,not just kicking I and hoping
As a fellow shivering fan at the LS last night, I left the stadium feeling like my pocket had been picked by the ref and VAR…from 2-0 up and coasting to a 2-1 loss that never looked likely. When will this team get a break…
I’d like to think the boos were directed at the ref, the team didn’t merit any on the night IMO.
The bottom line is that we had a run of four more likely to attain in games and we took one point.
That is bottom of the league stuff, it is relegation stuff, we’re now seven points plus goal difference is three wins adrift and we look like we could never make that up.
It is likely that as things stand we are the worst team in the division.
We need our full backs back from Africa, we need the two new strikers to do better than they did in their first game, and we need a first choice central defender in for it to still possibly not be enough.
I’ve been around since 69 and I don’t think we’ve ever been so nailed on for the drop.
Maybe the people booing were the ones who had been promised a NEW LEVEL , I’ve been supporting this team , my team , for 60 years , and if I can understand the boos surely anyone can, they paid good money to watch poor football, where was the fire , the energy, the fight ? Too many people blaming VAR , the REF , tiredness, the list goes on , get a grip , the booing is a product of poor performances , not just this one game, everyone at the club gets paid enough, for what ? Broken promises time and time again, it’s when the supporters show no dissent you should worry. West Ham are indeed one of ,if not the worst teams in the premiership, get used to the boos, it’s part of the game and always has been, it’s a privilege you PAY for…
No point in buying new forwards when we have no defence . Looked better going forward with the new guys but pointless if we keep conceding “easy ” goals . Why wasn’t a Cresswell type figure waiting on the doorstep 1 Jan .
VAR has killed football as it was meant to be but you can’t blame it for the position we are in unless it is run by Sullivan !!
Spot on Gonzo!
You’ll probably reflect in a few days Martin and realise that’s a tad dramatic but appreciate it’ll still be raw. It’s one game of football.
We didn’t deserve to lose but we did. Our fate isn’t decided by one game it’ll be 38 come the end of the season, and the fact is right now we don’t deserve to stay in the league based on performances so far.
As for VAR it’s here to stay and we should all be used to it by now. I’m not in favour of it for the record. Is the ball over the line yes fine use VAR, but not to decide if someone’s kneecap was in an offside position. There was enough action in the second phase of play for the goal to be justified and stand, but the fact is it was offside.
As for Areola. As an ex goalkeeper you can get away with that over the park but not in the EPL and he has previous with that type of challenge so clearly he doesn’t learn his lesson. He’s not tall, so why come that far off your line? But it was dangerous play based on the rule book. Do I think it was a pen, no, but again he knows the risks so why take the chance given our position and trying to protect a point or go for the win.
Side note, I thought Taty ran around a lot. Too early to judge on Pablo but at £20m I heard a WH fan say the other day you could buy the club Gil Vicente not some unknown. I hope he comes good but if that had been Harry and Mark Redknapp orchestrating that deal instead of Mendes and Nuno questions might be asked about where all of the £20m has gone. But hey when you base your scouting on using agents and rip up the game plan every time you change your manager this is what happens.
Sully has kicked too many issues down the road. This is potentially the year those issues finally catch up with us I’m very sorry to say.
I won’t bite on the boos. As clearly that comment has been made to provoke. I’m not in favour of it but when people make the effort and pay their hard earned cash they have a right to express their opinion in this new world we live in.
Should investigate the idiots who were in charge of var Rob Green agreeing with them was also ridiculous
We may have top tier football but have division 4 officials. The last 3 games have had officials from Billy Smarts Circus. So many mistakes both ways, unfortunately costing the Hammers more than the opposition. VAR is no help what so ever because you have the the same officials in charge of that, pick and choose what they look at and still don’t get them decisions right. Laughable
Yes agree totally. Lots of mistakes but the luck has also totally deserted West Ham this season as it does when a team is struggling so badly.
The sequence of events was so unlucky and cruel. At 2-0 I reckon even we would of won.
There is no serious football world where the goal was offside.
Milenkovic tackles Summerville getting the ball which spins off him to Taty. There was no pass or even last touch from Summerville.
Then minutes later to destroy belief and made heads drop a extraordinarily unlikely looped header goes on.
Then a penalty minutes from the end via VAR that is debatable to say the least so no time to recover even if we could.
The Pacqueta penalty, the Brighton handball goal etc etc it keeps happening as it does when the team is not performing.
Let’s just hope somehow we can play better and the luck turns.
I thought we were unfortunate, decisions going against us. That said VAR was right ( whether we like it or not) and works both ways. It probably seems worse for us as we can’t defend and don’t create enough attacking chances.
Our race is run now, the only consolation is that so many stupid decisions made by board are coming back to hit them where it hurts them most-their pockets Sullivan) and reputation (LB).
Winners of this game were VAR and one sided refereeing and I thought the team put in one of their best performances for some time
Such a shame that we have left it so late to start playing football rather than ambling along at walking pace
Noticeable that the defence looked so much better without Kilman
We need Houdini to avoid the drop but football is full of surprises so keep everything crossed