It is traditional to look for something positive to head into a new week after West Ham have yet again struggled and stumbled to another defeat. Apart from the obvious – there is only one more game in this festering pit of a season – there is something from yesterday that deserves highlighting and which helps maintain a sense of optimism moving into the summer.
Luis Guilherme. Called on infrequently during his debut season, the youngster has remained humble and apparently hardworking – and whenever his manager has called on him even just for five minutes- Guilherme hasn’t let Potter down.
Yesterday’s cameo offered real flair. A couple of fine interchanges of passes, some pacy running, a couple of Kudus-like dribbles – but without losing possession – and one blocked shot which was heading goal wards certainly gave cause for due credit.
If the stories we hear are true and Kudus is to be sold to pay for the rebuild, then Guilherme deserves more game time from the brief glimpses he’s shown in the second half of this season.
He’ll have five or six weeks to impress whilst Summerville gets fit after his hamstring injury so I, for one, am looking foreward to the young man growing steadily into the Hammers starting eleven come mid August when the Premier League gets going.
Real pace and Brazilian flair. Something to hang onto this summer!
I have watched all the matches with Graham Potter as coach. I think the team has played well against strong opponents like Aston Villa, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea, and others. Even though the team is a bit on the older side, the players have consistently fought until the bitter end in a way that really impresses me. This is despite the fact that they have had quite a bit of bad luck, in my opinion.
West Ham should have won yesterday against Nottingham. Nottingham’s second goal should have been disallowed for offside. The player who was offside influenced the play in my opinion. He interfered with the goalkeeper, who had to adjust his positioning. In the Arsenal vs PSG match, a similar goal was disallowed.
It was also incredibly frustrating that the referee allowed heavy pushes in the back of the West Ham players throughout the match. This negatively affected the performances of Kudus and Bowen. Bowen should have been awarded a penalty when he was brutally pushed into the goalpost.
Another awful performance aided and abetted by atrocious team selection . How can Potter justify picking WP in front of Soler or a troubled Paqueta. They both offer more than WP who is a total passenger. Alvarez has been a disappointment but is head and shoulders better than Rodriguez. Astonishingly Kilman has been ever present . There is no worse defender in the league and EVERY game he costs us a goal (s) . He wins nothing in the air in defence or attack . He is powder puff in the tackle and fails repeatedly to track his man . Fabianski , Coufal and Cresswell have been great servants to the club and have done plenty enough to be retained as squad players for next season . We have no obvious proven replacements and will not have the money or be attractive enough to sign ready made replacements . It is all very well buying new first team players ( if anyone will play for Sullivan !! ) but we are also buying in squad players when we have loyal Hammers stalwarts who can still do a job for us in the current disasterous state of affairs . Not ideal but a lot better than buying other clubs cast offs on free transfers. The club is run like a market stall by a spiv and will continue to be so while the current owners are in control . By the way Areola was given a 4 in the ratings … Yes a horendous mistake but he also made 3 great saves . Others in the team got 5s and 6s but contributed absolutly nothing . REALLY ??
We should be holding onto all our best players Dont see any top clubs selling theres LOOK at all our games Forest yesterday for instance Our problems are not individuals its team play Forest always had 4 or 5 players within yards of each other running movement wanting the ball By contrast when are building and attacking we 30 yards apart no movement no imagination no desire NO END RESULT THATS OUR REAL PROBLEM
Again with the PSR stuff…
PLEASE can someone explain (in a full article) how PSR works and where we stand with it, with actual facts and figures so we understand Zahama’s comment about PSR being the reason Potter is retained?
Dear Mr Buddy Lurve
I will try to give the limited basis on which I make the comment – I am here in South Africa (hence my name ZA Hammer or Zahama) and certainly do not have any inside sources at the London Stadium
My belief that PSR is real is based on the points deductions that were given to Everton and Forest last season and the fact that Villa sold Douglas Luiz and Duran for big money
What seems common knowledge is that the three year rolling loss should not exceed 105 million pounds – and the expenses include salaries as well as transfer fees and would also include compensation paid to fired managers
I have no idea what the amounts are but I know that we are already paying a lot to Loppy and I imagine would have to pay something to Potter and his team if we fired him before the reported break clause at the end of next season
What I don’t understand is how Chelsea in particular and Man City have avoided being penalized under PSR – it would be nice if one of these were to be relegated next season as it might help us to escape relegation
I believe (with no evidence to back it up) that our spending on new players will be influenced by this and that if we fired Potter it would mean that we have even less to spend
Sorry not to have any definite figures for you
Let us hope that this does happen – it would indeed be exciting
Otherwise the reality is that we have pissed the Declan money down the wall – and teh decisions from the board have been lamentable
1. Tim Steidten – not because he bought bad players but because he was not able to work with any manager
2. Lopetegui – not a popular choice and he didn’t prove his critics wrong
3. Potter – perhaps a knee-jerk reaction in retrospect – we could have limped to the end of the season with Lopetegui and now due to PSR we are stuck with Potter for next season – it looks like the doubters are being proved correct
Where do we go from here? I am not sure
COYI