Wednesday evening’s 2-1 victory over Villa saw the Hammers rise to 16th in the PL table. The manner of the victory, particularly the fighting spirit and togetherness exhibited, bode well for the prospects of salvaging West Ham’s season.
Yet, it has always been clear that this squad has enough quality to carry us in to the top half of the table. If there is a concern it is probably with the balance of the squad, with the goal keeper and full-back positions being covered by inexperienced, but promising youngsters and our true strength in depth being undermined by the long term injury absentees Ashton, Dyer and Boa Morte. As long as injuries do not start taking a toll of some of our key players (i.e. Cole and Illunga in the first instance) then our first choice XI and bench should enable us to compete.
Of course we would all have liked to have landed that top notch striker in the summer, but Cole’s amazing transformation continues apace, Franco looks an asset and Hines is shaping up to be an absolute relevation! Plus in Nouble and Dixon we have potentially two of the best young strikers in the country. It may be a bit too early for Nouble, but if he or Dixon come good this season then our striking options could suddenly be multiplied.
However, what we need is consistency. Having put a three match unbeaten run together it is vital that we follow up with a minium 4 point haul against Everton and Hull City. Personally, I feel that we could realistically secure maximum points from those two games. Everton have injury problems and their form has been chequered this season. While Hull City appear to be there for the taking with their current abject form. That would set us up nicely for a tough fought, but ultimately very winnerable home match against Burnley!
We are arguably at a key juncture in our season. What we need is a continuation of this run of good results to enable us to pull us away from the bottom three and adjust our season’s PL ambitions upwards to European quaification. In contrast, a defeat against Everton would push us back down in to the danger zone and potentially shatter the new found confidence around the club.
If draws against Arsenal and Sunderland provided the launch pad, the stunning win against Villa fired the engines and victory over Everton could provide ‘lift off’ to recovery and greater ambition! As such, it could actually prove a pivotal match, much like Portsmouth away was last season.
Personally, I think it will be lift off ! Why? Because I think West Ham will show the skill, passion and, ultimately, consistency necessary to continue this current run of positive results!
SJ Chandos.
Next 3 matches will either take us closer to the top 4 or a mediocre season.Confidence will be high and it will be good for the other boys to show we can score without Carlton.
May seem a silly question but Diamante 6 million pounds on the bench unfit or not part of theplan?
Did The Wizard look like a ferret ?ask thelocal authority to finish hio\\s hair off!
Hi aussis, don't worry too much about Diamanti. It ALWAYS takes foreign players half a season minimum to adapt to the pace, tempo and power of english football.
Diamanti will be a first team regular for the second half of the season, GZ is just blooding him gently.
Hi Aussie,
Diamante was on the side line warming up on Wednesday night,perhaps Zola is saveing him for Sunday.We were all screaming at Zola to put him on..Just a thought do you see the match programmes or get hold of them?
Personally I have little idea why Badger Boy came on in the 87th minute! Diamanti should have been on with 15 to go, for me.
It is quite amazing what not losing can do for everyones spirts.
To get 7 or even 9 points from the next 3 matches is more than possible and such a run would rise the confidence levels higher , to deal with the more difficult matches ahead.
However, how optimistic things seem now, I know as we all to how unpredictable our beloved team is.
Here’s hoping:-)
I agree SJ consistency along with confidence and a little luck is all tats needed, Hines has I feel proved what he can do and gives us another option going forward were with cole and franco we look like we can score almost at will. I was pleased to see that Zola made changes at the back aginst Villa and his choices seemed to give green a bit more confidence. I would hope we can now push on and look at getting max points over the next 3 games. I would like to think that zola is now looking at improving the defence in Jan we still IMO need a RB and cover / competation for LB. a top 10 finish will be a good season and year 2 of the project ill be complete without spending much and unearthing 1 or 2 stars
Looking forward to sunday and with the results going the right way on saturday we could by monday be were we belong. COYI !!!!!!!!
SJ value your balanced view and optimism and reflects how we are feeling now after the fantastic win against Villa on Wednesday. Everton – winable definately, but they are our bogey team and I fear a defeat. But, I am looking forward to how we play without Cole, not that I want Cole out of course, but to see how the team react and work together. With Hines up front we play a different game. The key for us is winning matches against teams around us and many of those have taken heavy defeats – Hull, Blackburn and Portsmouth. If we beat the teams just above and below us we are in the top half of the table for sure. If we perform like we usually do against the top teams, Europe is possible but we have taken our time to get started this season and will ultimately make a difference when it comes to the tail end of the season. Hopeful and if I am honest, excited! The young players will hopefully step up to the plate and we will see a few good results come our way.
Everton have always been a difficult team for us but I think a draw is on the cards,Parker is the guvnor!! and he is better than lampard.
You can't still be drinking at this time of the morning, chris?
I like your posts Chris – they are always short, to the point and they are always wrong!
Yes just like 4 4 2.
It's a crass comparison in my view. One attacks towards the edge of the box, with an uncanny knack of gettingon the end of bits and pieces as well as producing some really quite awesome strikes. The other has a superb engine and is a committed ball winner who often turns himself inside out and ends up passing the ball square or eben back to his defenders. They really are chalk and cheese – totally different players.
And, once again for the record, I utterly detest Lampard
I predict 9 points from the 3 games. Everton, so long our bogey team, have key players missing and, more to the point, are struggling with form and have just played a Europa cup game. If we can avoid conceding corners and keep tight to Cahill the points are in the bag.
Hull are dismal and should be seen off with the minimum of fuss. That just leaves Burnley. A side that won't kick us off the park and play football. Thankfully, they are rubbish away from home and leak goals.
I'm expecting 9 points but will take 7 with a draw against Everton.
SJ, I think the theme of your message is correct, but I'd go one step further with the word consistency… Its not just results or overall performances that need to be consistent, its individual performances as well.
It will be interesting to see the results of the player performances poll after the villa game, but I personally didn't rate any player less than 6… which isn't something I could have said too often this year. So, consistency of individual performances, together with hard graft and the skill we possess, will no doubt yield the collective performances and results we need to shoot back up the table.
We've all said recently that to progress, we need to cut out the farcical mistakes we've been making.. and on Tuesday night, we did that. So… repeat the performance against a pretty ordinary Everton team Sunday and 3 points (and 13th place in the league) are there for us..
COYI….
I can't believe people are talking about top 4! We have won ONE home game and ONE away game all season! Whereas I agree with SJ's thoery that we need to be consistent, I think we are all getting a bit above ourselves here!
Yes, we won on weds night! But we didn't win so convincingly that we should expect 9 points from the next 3 games!
It's going to be a case of seeing what happens! Of all the teams we have coming up over the next 3 weeks, Burnley are going to give us teh biggest test!
Ah, realism, such an overated pastime:)
Lol what WAS I thinking!!
Spot on Matt- one win and the loonies take over the park!
I would bite your hand off right now for 15th place!
Conistency, well I hope that Sundays game against Everton will bring in the much needed 3points. With their injuries and having played last night they should be possible to turn over. as for Hull & Burnley as long as we play as well as we have recently and against Villa to pull out all the stops we should take the 3 points__as for Burnley we need to out in a similar game as we did at Stoke as they are more than likely take the game to us. Hopefully 9 from 3 but at least 7.Lol!!
http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/2009/11/06/ka...
another one to add to list ian !!! thanks to mr brand that is
a most edifying sight jjjjon – sorry – shaking hand syndrome there! lol
Matt, are you able to tell me why my posts have Edit Delete against me
and why I receive replies through my email and not on the thread
I also login to post and then receive an error report on screen telling me that i am not logged on
Please Advise???
ThanksLol!!
The Edit and Delete function is something we all have! We can edit and delete our own posts until it has been replied to!
I also had the problem of receiving the replies by email and not on the site but it just fixed itself!
I received the not logged error with IE but it's all good with Firefox and Chrome!
The recent results have been a step in the right direction, but its equally true that we could have lost all three games. Under Zola the style of football has improved immeasurably and the players appear to want to play for him. However Zola's record in teh transfer market isn't too impressive. Nsereko and Diamanti don't look to have been good buys. Does swapping Collins for Diamenti look like a good buy at this stage of the season. Collins was a major part of why we looked so solid last season.
I don't want to be too critical of Zola (or Clarke) but it would be myopic to ovelook some of heir mistakes. So far their record in the transfer market isn't great – although it has to be said their hands have been tied behind their backs. The problem this season has been conceeeding too many goals. Scoring hasn't been sucha big issue.
We look niave at set pieces and open in mdfied. To me priority would be getting a dominant centre half anyone but Faubert at right back. I always thought Lucas Neil was the worst right back in the Premiership before seeing Faubert perform in that role. Hopefully he, Lucas Neilm that is, will play at full back on Sunday! Surely Spector is a better option.
I feel we should forget about Dyer, Ashton and Boa Morte going forwards. I have long held the view that Ashton is vastly overrated, and probably finished as top class centre forward. Not many palyers make it back after so long out of the game.
Back to this season – I feel its unrealistic to talk about Europe, and comfortable survival is the best we can hope for. I would say finishing anything above 12th would be a great achievement unless there is a dramatic turnaround in the financial/ ownership situation. Should we lose key players in the January transfer market relegation will be a distinct possibility.
The so called "project" is looking more and more like a naked emperor: a justification for a lack of ambition and activity in the transfer market. everyone knows we are skint. No one knows quite how skint. I guess January will tell us.
Common sense suggests we keep our best players to preserve our premiership status. Lets see if common sense prevails.
We look niave at set pieces and open in mdfied. To me priority would be getting a dominant centre half anyone but Faubert at right back. I always thought Lucas Neil was the worst right back in the Premiership before seeing Faubert perform in that role. Hopefully he, Lucas Neilm that is, will play at full back on Sunday! Surely Spector is a better option.
I feel we should forget about Dyer, Ashton and Boa Morte going forwards. I have long held the view that Ashton is vastly overrated, and probably finished as top class centre forward. Not many palyers make it back after so long out of the game.
Back to this season – I feel its unrealistic to talk about Europe, and comfortable survival is the best we can hope for. I would say finishing anything above 12th would be a great achievement unless there is a dramatic turnaround in the financial/ ownership situation. Should we lose key players in the January transfer market relegation will be a distinct possibility.
The so called "project" is looking more and more like a naked emperor: a justification for a lack of ambition and activity in the transfer market. everyone knows we are skint. No one knows quite how skint. I guess January will tell us.
Common sense suggests we keep our best players to preserve our premiership status. Lets see if common sense prevails.
Trust Chelsea to get off with a suspended sentence which means that if they pull this off. (CAS are busy now for the hearing to be heard before the Christmas break )they will be able to do any if not all transfers in January and then if found guilty will not have to worry about the summer TW
The so called "project" is looking more and more like a naked emperor: a justification for a lack of ambition and activity in the transfer market. everyone knows we are skint. No one knows quite how skint. I guess January will tell us.
Common sense suggests we keep our best players to preserve our premiership status. Lets see if common sense prevails.
I am REALLY sorry to go off topic – but bugger me, have you seen the pictures in the papers of Katy Perry wearing a West Ham basque at the EMA's. WOWSER!!!!!
For those poor souls missing the story, it can be found here;
http://www.mirrorfootball.co.uk/opinion/blogs/foo...
I'm finding it very hard not to go into 'Carry on' mode – but…….(i cant stop myself dammit) – there's a fine pair of strikers that you could play 2 up top with (i'm going to burn in hell for this!)
Back to sensible discussions later…………….
Much rather stay with Katy Perry….
And true to form, Jolly, our beloved BBC have put together a slideshow featuring all of Miss Perry's costume changes for the evening… all except the West Ham 'kit'. Conspiracy theory? Me? Never (ahem).
http://news.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/hi/entertainment/n...
Ok, serious discussion time.
If you were to take our next three games in isoation (Everton @ home, Hull Away, Burnley @ home) and discuss any of these games with friends – all three would be looked at as potential 3 points. So this has to be the aim – this IS the defining point of our season. 9 points from the next 3 games will catapult us into the top half of the table where i would expect us to stay. 6 or 7 points will help us make up a few places and will enalbe us to finish comfortably above the relegation scrap. 5 points will keep us out of the bottom 3 but could signal dificulties ahead. Less than 5 points and we are in BIG trouble.
As a Michael Jackson lookalike once said, "THIS IS IT".
The story of our season will unfold in the next 3 games.
And for the record – top half of the tabke means just that (8th/9th or 10th), i have no dellusions of European football next year!!!
I don't think we'd be ready to do well in Europe next year but, that said, it would probably help our development if we did qualify (that point is something that was debated extensively on here about a year ago I think)
How do you think participation in the Europa cup would have affected us this season, Gav? I reckon we would be staring at more injuries and be in more trouble than we already are.
I always said it would have been a disaster for us, Devo and I have seen absolutely nothing to change my mind – either looking at our own poor early season form, the exit of a class side like villa or the relatively lowly league position of Everton. to make a success of europe and the EPL you need a serious squad, not just a serious 1st 11
I think it would have been a bit of a nightmare DevoDevo. You're right that we'd probably have injured more key players. Our squad's not up to it at the moment.
"Less than 5 points and we are in BIG trouble"
So that would be a minimum of the next 3 games unbeaten to add to the last three hames then. So that would be a minimum of achieving a 6 game unbeaten run. Any less and we are in BIG trouble?? Come on.
This is West Ham. This is Football. 'Course I'd love 9 points, or 7 points and, yes, it may well happen. Indeed I am actually quite optimistic that it ust might. 5 points wouldn't be a disaster by any means though, but apparently 4 would? Too early for such a 'must win' attitude in my book.,
Tend to agree, 'BIG' trouble would be 0 points from these three games, then I really would be worried! Like you I think we can take maximum points from these games, but then again we are West Ham and will probably end up without a win from these games, then beat Man U.
This looks like being another of those super-competitive Premier League seasons. At the start of the season the sensible money would have been on perm three from Hull, Burnley, Pompey, Wolves, Birmingham and Bolton for the bottom three.
Well, last time i looked – at least 3 of those teams were above us and Pompey have won 2 out of their last 3. We will need around 36 pts to guarantee our top-flite status – 26pts from the next 25 games.
So I stand by my original statement – 4 pts or less from our next 3 games will see us in no better than 17th place going into the Xmas programme with games including Man U, Bolton Away, Chelsea and Spuds to look forward to.
Like all long suffering Hammers fans i always hope for the best but expect the worst,yes the next three are important and winnerble but lets not pin everything on these games to shape our season!What is good is we are scoring enough goals to win games and not all from Cole which is good as it takes so much pressure of him to be the main man.So renewed optimism yes, cautious yes West ham til i die definately!
Nopw with our little bit of confidence on the back of a win and 2 draws
technically if we keep the momentum going with another win Sunday and IF I say IF we also pick up wins against Hull & Burnley that means we would be on 19 points( (yes I know we can all add up) and with other results going our way we would be upto 5/6th place alongside Spurs Villa Etc.
We just hope that all the clubs have a bad couple of weeks results wise.
But looking at it from a positive view we could be up to 8/9Th position.
Let us hope the confidence and form continues to build and that the lift of SJ
talks about is not just a dud rocket left over from Guy Fawkes night.
I've never seen so many versions of the word winnable!
How about threepointgetable?
Can't help thinking that we are defining the season a tad too soon. How many times have we been in a position where people say, "we must win the next 2 games" , we lose them and somehow those games importance suddenly deminishes, and all is not lost after all. Yes, all 9 points from the next 3 games would be great, particularly in view of some of the following games, but all is not lost if we don't get them.
my point exactly scaly. people talk utter drivel about 'must win' games. history just laughs in the face of all of these statements. anyone remember season 2006/7
matt you alright m8? I agree with you, just because we beat Villa, doesnt mean were in for a top 4 or 6, or even a 10, we must not get too happy, we’ve got to be patient.
Good news on the prediction front…..Lawro has us down for losing 0 2 against Everton.
I'm stunned! What – Mark "Whining Voice" Lawrenson predicting a West Ham loss? Nah – don't believe it.
Honest, great news.
Lol! – Yep – he does often get it wrong.
This is off topic (nothing new I hear you cry!) but does anyone else find it it ironic that Kevin "its nothing about the money or me bing a grubby little man its all about justice and seeing wrong doers punnushed) McCabe has reward paddy kenny for cheating by giving him a new contract at the club while he is still serving a ban for taking performance enhancing drugs?
Lets be honest paddy kenny is a distinctly average keeper who played the game of his life to deny preston a chance to make the play off finals while on the bob martins!
Luckily for the blunts Preston are an honest club who prefer to settle matters on the list and not call up the nearts bunch of ambulance chasing compo claiming shysters to take legal action against anyone they feel has wronged them!
Lol! Say what you mean CH – don't hold it all back mate.
I did hold back! You should have heard the language I wanted to use!
In that case perhaps we should arrange a chance meeting in a dark alley with Mr McCabe for you CH.
I reckon the centre circle at Upton Park for a home game would be best, I can pretty much guarantee that all 30000 Hammers fans would tell the cops they were in the loo when the "alleged" incident took place!
Any news on the Cole injury anyone,I know we won with out him the other night,but he's return is vital in the next few games ,hope its not 4 weeks which is the usual for a bad hamstring,sorry I'd still rather parker in my West Ham team tham lamplard.
I have a question for y'all. Being that Ilunga may be injured and since Mr Moneybags departed we've had Faubert and Spector at right back and they don't cut it, has any of you seen the potential replacement in the stiffs?????
If so, what are they like?
I must say the threads have become relativley ordered/peacefull since the unclean/unregistered brigade have been banished, beware though, we will soon be peeing each other off and will be able to hold grudges for years.:).
To alleviate this, can we have a why we love Shefscum, redneck and spuds day!
Here, here Sir.
Don't forget our West London cousins.
Well I say cousins, it begins with a "C".
All thanks to me! lol
we salute you, sir Matt! lol
Is that it? A bloody SALUTE???? lol
I'd offer my sister, but she wouldn't agree.
The last thing we need is qualifying for Europe. After a season long campaign staving off the threat of relegation whilst battling against injury problems and constantly having the shadow of the circling vultures overhead I think that our under strength and over worked squad will deserve a couple of weeks on the beach somewhere without worrying about going to Albania or some other god forsaken hole in July.
I notice that TOSSER over at "The Game's Gone Crazy" has started slagging off Iain again!
What is his problem? That blog is pathetic!
He must be jealous! His blog gets NO replies at all!
Ignore the twat Iain!
Agree that Iain should ignore such personal attacks which are surely borne out of jealousy.
When I spoke with him a while back about another vitriolic attack in another medium, he pointed out to me that in his walk of life your skin needs to be pretty thick.
The number of posts on this site says it all.
I haven't got the time or inclination to get into another site but I did feel that some of the author's writing on the game's gone crazy was quite good as it goes/
How long are cole and ilunga out for?
oh how I would love the Irons to beat man u, the team I use to support before i came to west ham,
Just noticed these stats on the BBC website, so thought I would share them. The last one really took me by surprise.
Everton are unbeaten in four out of their last five visits to Upton Park and have won on their last two trips.
• Everton won both of their league games against the Hammers last season by a 3-1 scoreline.
• In 28 Premier League games against Everton, West Ham have never scored more than two goals in one game. They have scored just 23 against the Toffeemen, an average of only 0.82 goals per game.
(All those stats aside my abiding memory is of that great Elland Road night when we beat Everton in the semi final, a repeat on Sunday would be most welcome)
West Ham
• Robert Green has saved six penalties in the Premier League since August 2006.
• The Hammers have thrown away seven points from winning positions this season – those seven points would put them comfortably in mid-table.
• West Ham have won almost 80% of their tackles this season – a league high.
Obviously no longer the 'soft southern' touches!
has any1 got any news on any takeover at west ham, thanks..
We should have hired the lawyer from Chelsea instead of the one from man U.
whos west hams lawyer anyway?
I'm a big fan of this blog however rarely post but thought I would raise a couple of points about the season so far.
First, As has been stated before our home form compared to the equivalent fixtures last year has actually improved (although clearly not good!). The equivalent first six fixtures including tomorrow reaping 3 points (the Fulham win) so it is not a total disaster.
Secondly, Zola is clearly passionate about 4-3-3. Last year he tried DDM and Etherington up front with Cole on a number of occasions and it didn't often work. The signings this sumer appear to have been an attempt to get more appropriate players for the system but could not be considered a success! I agree with many posters that two forwards working closer together better suits our squad and therir ability. I think we should be patient with these imports particularly Jiminez who is clearly taking time to adjust but I think is a real talent. Few overseas players make an immediate impact and Diamanti has surprised me at how relatively well he has done
I just watched the Villa highlights to have a closer look at the penalties as my seat in the Doctor Martins Stand is not close to the Trevor Borooking end You can see Beye gets the ball but it looks to me that he gets Hines first. Hines certainly looks offside but they get missed all the time. Watching the da Costa pen I can only assume that Steve Bennett could not believe he could get so high and assumed he had climbed…either that or he felt he made a ricket for ours and wanted to even the score.
Finally I thought da Costa was excellent on Wednesday (really handled Carew well) and whilst I am a great fan of James Collins he demonstrated once again that he is very flat footed against quicker forwards.
So glass half full for me and hopefully we get something from Everton tomorrow. It is long overdue.
LMAO – Just make sure we're playing Preston at the time.
(Said in a scouse accent) -caaaarm down la', caaarm down
Sheffield Utd are an irrelevance. Long may they remain so. Along with Millwall, Crystal Palace and Charlton.
Not worthy of a reaction.
So, don't give em one, eh ?
It was Wilde I believe who said that there is nothing so annoying as when people stop talking about you! So, let's do just that.