Nuno rang the changes for this evenings sell-out West Ham home fixture against Wrexham, dropping Pablo and Ollie Scarles to the bench and bringing back Taty plus a starting debut for centre back Morata – as a left back. Which raised a few eyebrows.
Infuriatingly West Ham started in their ‘slow’ mode: Side, side, back with zero urgency was the uncomfortably dull order of the day for the first twenty minutes, as if points were awarded for every completed pass between keeper and back four and the goal was to send their own supporters into a trance like state. Bowen crashed one shot against the bar but other than that, there was little to excite: And then everything just clicked, like instantly shifting from first gear to fifth.
With one incisive forward pass from Mukasa to Solomon to cut Wrexham wide open, an overlap and a low cross from Morata (looking pretty good as an overlapping, attacking left back!) and Bowen stole in between defenders to side foot West Ham ahead.
Ten minutes later thanks to Taty Castellanos bending a run perfectly to stay on side, squaring to set up Joel Piroe who competed the move perfectly, shooting into the top of the net, the Hammers were looking good at 2-0 and apart from needing a clearance off the line by Mavropanos, West Ham went in two up at the break looking as comfortable as they had all season.
The only cloud in Nuno’s first half being Veltman limping off midway through, replaced by Kyle Walker Peters.
No sooner had the second half begun than West Ham scored again via the now familiar Bowen corner for Mavropanos to head in and within a couple of minutes the Irons had a 3-0 lead and were strolling. This is how we’d envisioned the Championship once, as fans, we’d reconciled ourselves to relegation.
The biggest challenge left for Nuno’s side now in the last 40 minutes was to try and keep that elusive clean sheet.
And the sublime fourth goal – a break from a Wrexham corner – had the crowd on their feet in appreciation of a perfect counter-attacking goal. Kyle Walker Peters’ run from defence, covering most of the length of the pitch, with a quick one-two for good measure, set up Taty for a perfect side footed shot into the bottom corner. No more than Castellanos deserved after his hold up play tonight which had been excellent. 4-0 and the olé’s were back with West Ham dominant, with still 25 minutes to play.
And then an utterly magnificent fifth, substitute Mohamadou Kanté, blasting into the roof of the net after Solomon sent him through: Wrexham had been demolished. ‘Showing no mercy‘ claimed the SkyTV commentary as Solomon fired in a sixth, again thanks to Walker Peters’ running, and surely West Ham were done.
Outstanding.
Great win but the team is always starting so slow with no urgency to pass forward. We look like a team that will easily be promoted but we wil need a lot of work when we do.
Nuno OUT…does himself!!!
Well done, I now find myself having to process a whole new set of emotions I’m not used to.
But I’d certainly like to get used to them 😁👌⚒️⚒️⚒️
That was a mismatch. I do not remember the last time we were that comfortable. That’s the starting line up for me, I thought 2-0 before the start but the gulf in quality was almost embarrassing.