Click HERE to rate the performances of the West Ham players who played against WBA
Back in January 2011 West Ham were in a downward spiral. Avram Grant had lost the dressing room. Martin O’Neill was lined up to take over but then changed his mind., West Ham then unexpectedly won a match towards the end of the month and the owners decided to stick with him. Bad mistake. We ended up being relegated. Those of us who couldn’t understand Grant’s appointment in the first place weren’t exactly surprised.
We now find ourselves at the end of the year firmly rooted in the bottom three, having played a series of matches where our performances have been less than inspiring. Luck hasn’t gone our way, to be sure, but throughout December we haven’t deserved to get much out of any of the games. Today’s was another where we were lucky to get a point, even though we led twice.
I’ll come on to today’s performance in a moment, but the main point of this blogpost is to make an appeal to the joint-chairmen. Make a decision and stick with it. If you’re going to fire Allardyce, do it now. This evening. But if you are not going to fire him, stick with him. You’re in the best position to judge whether he can make it and turn things around. Use your experience from the Grant era to inform your decision, but it is your decision and you need to be accountable for it. And if you are going to give Allardyce your confidence, you need to buy two central defenders and two strikers in January. Nothing less will be good enough. If you fire Allardyce, you’ll still need to do this, FFP or no FFP.
It was a pulsating game and it was a game we put ourselves in a great position to win. Bizarrely, I had fallen asleep on the sofa and only woke up when I heard the roar of the crowd as Joe Cole put us one up after only three minutes. [In case you are wondering why I wasn’t actually at the match, I’m on a ten day break in Norfolk]. So I missed the fact that Kevin Nolan played an assist. So when I later tweeted “Just realised Kevin Nolan is actually on the pitch” I got some well deserved abuse. We had two more chances to increase our lead, but as usual didn’t put them away. So it came as little surprise when WBA scored and then put in a second on the stroke of half time. We weren’t exactly helped by having James Tomkins injured, resulting in four full backs playing across defence. You do have to question why we had no central defender from the Development Squad on the bench. I think Pelly Ruddock is on loan at Luton Town. Perhaps he should have been recalled.
At 2-1 down you always fancied West Brom to add to their lead. Anelka, Berhani and Brunt were on fire. Enter Modibo Maiga. He came on for Carlton Cole at half time and quickly put in a brilliant long range shot which Foster parried wide. A few minutes later he hit another one from outside the area which Foster let under his body. Maiga sunk to his knees and I am pretty sure I saw him wiping tears away. A few minutes later up he jumped to head the ball down for Nolan to smash into the net. So Nolan had two assists and a goal, with Maiga grabbing a goal and an assist.
I have to say I thought it was a very jittery performance from Jussi. Not what we have come to expect. He was certainly at fault for their third goal. Defensively I suppose we did about as well as could have been expected with no recognised central defender for more than three quarters of the game. Noble put in his usual committed performance but Diame was again a disappointment. Nolan will rest of the fact that he got two assists and a goal, but for large parts of the game he just disappears and it appears we are a man down. i thought both Cole and Maiga did well, which is at least some consolation.
So, as we all struggle to come to terms with the fact that we are in a serious relegation battle, the next 30 days are certainly going to be very interesting for our club. Let’s try and be as calm as we can.
Jussi 5, Demel 6, O’Brien 6, McCartney 6, Rat 6, Noble 7, Diame 5, Nolan 6, Cole J 6, Cole C 6, Maiga 7, Jarvis 7,