Madness for West Ham to sell Johnson
I’ll come straight out and say it . . . Ben Johnson has performed well for West Ham this season.
Granted, he hasn’t played too frequently, but when I have seen him, he’s been decent. During last night’s 1-0 FA Cup loss to Bristol City, Johnson was a second-half substitute for Vladimir Coufal.
Not only was Johnson significantly better than the man he replaced, but he was actually West Ham’s best player for the duration of his appearance. Alongside Emerson, he was the only player who looked capable of dribbling past his opposite number, and more importantly, he seemed to care.
It’s madness for West Ham to sell Ben Johnson
Johnson also emerged with credit from West Ham’s Carabao Cup mauling at the hands of Liverpool. On that occasion, he played reasonably well at left-back and assisted Jarrod Bowen for his goal with a wonderful pass.
Which begs the question . . . why aren’t West Ham giving him a new contract? Forget FFP because we’re nowhere near it; this is a football decision because if David Moyes wanted to keep him, the club would negotiate a deal.
Vladimir Coufal is in terrible form, Dan Chesters isn’t ready yet, Thilo Kehrer has been sold, and The Hammers are not in the market for a right back. Johnson is home-grown, has been at the club since he was 8, and at 24, he is approaching maturity, having played close to 100 games for the club.
For some reason, the club is looking to sell him, and I just don’t get it
I have regularly raised the same point as you re selling him, and as you say it is even more ridiculous now. He was used horribly by Moyes a couple of seasons ago, playing in four different ‘fill in’ positions in odd games and being dropped immediately each time. He never had any consistent game time and never in the same position. Yet suddenly some fans were saying he’s useless and get rid, when nobody else had been subject to that disruption. I’ve always liked him, thought he had great potential but was let down by bad man management. I still think so and agree with your point – selling him now is mad.
Ben Johnson played very well from the moment he came on as substitute. He has always had the talent and I could never understand how he lost favour with Moyes. It seemed to me that Moyes was responsible for Johnson’s loss of confidence. Well, Ben Johnson is a good player who can play right or left back and we need to keep him at the club. I quite agree that he was, alongside Emerson, the best we had on the pitch against Bristol City. Why would the Hammers let some other lucky club snap up one of our best players? Moyes needs to pull his head in!