Guest Post by Gary Hymams
I watched the Fulham game in Bulgaria. My son, who lives there, and I spent two days working out the best option. The game would be on Bulgarian TV, but one would have to put up with a commentary in Arabic or Russian. There is a bar in the high street, where the Bulgarian owner is a West Ham fan and, sure enough, on the day, when we walked past, he was wearing a West Ham shirt. Then, I had a live chat with BT Sport and discovered their app can be viewed anywhere in the EU (for how long?), which is rather helpful.
So, after some difficulty with screen mirroring from a phone to the TV, we settled down in comfort, although it went to streaming a couple of time which was worrying.
Basically, when abroad, I would walk 10 miles or go without food for two days in order to watch a game. I’m sure you would too.
However, what I didn’t count on were my grandchildren. Did I want to play with slime? Did I want to eat the slime? I didn’t realise how big my grandson’s head is , until he put it between me and the TV. My son went to the kitchen to get them some snacks and missed the first goal. Thereafter, my granddaughter kept telling him to go to the kitchen, so West Ham would score again.
When West Ham scored, the grandchildren went berserk and my grandson, who is five, wasn’t even watching the game.
So, my reflections of each player:
Fabianski – Fabulanski
Masuaku – Why the hell is he a left back? Surely, he would make a better midfielder?
Balbuena – completely solid
Diop – Reliable as usual
Zabaleta – a great game, although when he gets to the byline, he seems to run out of ideas and execution.
Noble – he can deliver a killer pass either for us or backwards for the opposition.
Snodgrass – complete respect for the way he has gone about improving his game.
Rice – reminds me of Bobby Moore the way he distributes the ball
Antonio – Scored another great goal and seems to have got his confidence back in front of goal.
Hernandez – seemed to only have one touch the whole game, but that paid his salary.
Anderson – Wonderful and still seems not up to his best. Better than Payet in defence.
Carroll – If you bring him on, at least get to the byline and get some crosses over
Diangana – Hope he doesn’t lose that initial confidence
Obiang – reliable
So, approaching the transfer window, let’s play a Christmas game and value our team:
Fabianski £25 million
Masuaku £10 Million
Zabaleta a pat on the back
Diop £40 million
Balbuena £25 million
Noble – a pat on the back
Snodgrass £20 million
Rice £45 million
Antonio £20 million
Hernandez £5 million
Diangana – £20 million
Carroll – £10 million
Arnautovic – £50 million
Anderson – £55 million
Obiang – £10 million
Come on you Irons . I’ve finally lost that sick feeling in my stomach.
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