Bayer Leverkusen 2-0 West Ham: Europa League
Sometimes football is complicated and sometimes it’s simple; yesterday was the latter. Bayer Leverkusen, who are an attacking team with options on the bench, and West Ham aren’t. So, in last night’s quarter-final, we saw a plucky Hammers team, with a heroic goalkeeper, eventually get undone once substitutions had been made.
Xabi Alonso had eventual goal scorers Victor Boniface and Jonas Hofmann to bring off his bench, while Moyes had some defenders and a bunch of attackers he’d rather not use.
While as a West Ham fan I’m disappointed with the result, we are not the victims here. That was a defeat totally of our own making. The seeds of the defeat were sown in January when Said Benrahma and Pablo Fornals were allowed to leave, and we screwed up the transfer of Ibrahim Osman.
Old pals: Steidten and Alonso hug it out after the final whistle
Prepare to fail
The winter transfer window left us with the second oldest and smallest squad in the Premier League. It was never designed to withstand injury and suspension and was always going to be a gamble.
Claret & Hugh has certainly benefited from good sources within the club over the years, and I absolutely believe that David Moyes was offered players in January. Tim Steiden had a list, and even David Sullivan got involved with a few suggestions of his own. The club were adamant that a striker and winger needed to be recruited, but all suggestions were rebuffed.
Last night’s 2-0 loss was the culmination of the unfinished work in January. Moyes isn’t the only one to blame for that failure because ultimately, the director of football should wield enough power and influence to force through a deal if it will benefit the club.
Where Moyes is to blame is his refusal to use his substitutes and academy players. Selling Benrahma and Fornals is one thing, but to not use Maxwel Cornet after letting them go is a horrendous waste of £17 million.
The fact of the matter is that Moyes doesn’t really trust anyone on his bench. So when Xabi Alonso looked to his reserves, he saw match-winners. When David Moyes looked at his, he just saw risk, which ironically is precisely how he plays his football.
Having watched West Ham for many years I have to say I am rather ashamed of my team at present in terms of the style of play. I see no desire to play football and win a game just defend and hope. During Covid the team did improve but failed to build on this improvement and have since gone backward the past 2 years. West Ham supporters have every right to be upset with the lack of progress and in particular the tactics and arrogance of the manager. Every time I hear him talk he keeps telling us how great he’s been getting us in Europe the past 3 seasons and suggests we should be grateful given we are little West Ham. He needs to understand as do others that we no longer want mediocre football, we as supporters want to move onward and upward playing modern day football, building a younger faster team who are capable of playing on the front foot. I actually believe that Moyes has been damaging our club for a while and must go at the end of the season. We need to invest heavily in the summer with players who can actually keep the ball and can confidently pass and receive and have the required pace to mix it in the premier league.
If all West Ham have got is to defend all game then we shouldn’t even be in Europe you need to score goals to win moyes thinks buy defenders and defend all game what is wrong with that moyes goals win games not what till we are behind then try and score I’ve ssurpoted West Ham when brooking was playing for us now every game I think what a load of shit playing football like we are scared of every team we play moyes your football ls boreing and shit getting sick of watching them until we get rid of moyes not wasting my money or time watching them
Agree 100% we have had a thread bare squad for the last 2/3 season….just got mostly lucky with injuries….absolutely staggering when moyes makes the same transfer blunders 3 seasons in a row especially with forwards….this is mostly the reason fans have had enough..just look at the list of players we had a good chance of getting…Toney and Watkins for 2 …cash ezre..list goes on …this is most of the reason why utd got rid of him ….his dithering is absolutely infuriating and there board said as much