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Dan Coker's Match Preview

Match Preview: Chelsea v West Ham

Blast from the past

3rd February 1962: Cliff Richard and The Shadows were number one with ‘The Young Ones’, John Wayne was in UK cinemas in The Comancheros and comedian Eddie Izzard was born four days later. In west London, West Ham United were hammering another nail into Chelsea’s relegation coffin in a game full of connections between the cross-city rivals.

The match saw former Hammer Andy Malcolm line up for the hosts alongside Peter Brabrook, who was to join the Irons eight months later. Ron Tindall had joined West Ham as part of the deal which saw Malcolm move to Chelsea just a few months before this game, and the centre-forward took his place in the visitors’ attack. Joe Kirkup was also in the West Ham team, four years before he went on to join Chelsea. The match also saw 18-year-old inside-forward Colin Shaw make his one and only appearance for the Blues – he moved to Norwich in August 1963.

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Hammers legend Bobby Moore, then aged just 20, scored the only goal of the game in a 1-0 win for the visitors. It was the fifth of his 27 goals in claret and blue and his third of the 1961/62 season, having scored twice in a 4-2 win over Wolves in December 1961. Moore would make his England debut in Peru three months later and represent his country at the 1962 World Cup, starting all four of the Three Lions’ matches at the tournament in Chile which saw England defeated at the quarter-final stage by a Garrincha-inspired Brazil.

The win helped Ron Greenwood’s Hammers claim eighth position in the First Division of 1961/62, while Tommy Docherty’s Blues would finish bottom and were relegated. Scottish goalkeeper Lawrie Leslie was voted Hammer of the Year, with fellow Scot John Dick runner-up. Dick was also the Irons’ top scorer that season with 23 goals in 38 appearances, although he didn’t feature in this game at Stamford Bridge. Alf Ramsey’s Ipswich won the league and Tottenham won the FA Cup.

Chelsea: Peter Bonetti, Ken Shellito, Dennis Butler, Terry Bradbury, Mel Scott, Graham Moore, Andy Malcolm, Peter Brabrook, Colin Shaw, Bobby Tambling, Frank Blunstone.

West Ham United: Lawrie Leslie, Joe Kirkup, John Bond, Eddie Bovington, Ken Brown, Bobby Moore, Tony Scott, Phil Woosnam, Alan Sealey, Ron Tindall, Malcolm Musgrove.

Club Connections

A decent number of players have represented both West Ham United and Chelsea. 2008 Hammer of the Year Robert Green is currently on the Blues’ books but is yet to make an appearance for them. Victor Moses spent the 2015/16 season on loan with the Hammers and is still a Chelsea player, albeit currently on loan at Fenerbahce in Turkey. Others to have worn the colours of both clubs include:

Goalkeepers: Craig Forrest and Harry Medhurst.

Defenders: Tal Ben Haim, Scott Minto, Wayne Bridge, Ian Pearce, Joe Kirkup, Glen Johnson and Jon Harley.

Midfielders: Bill Jackson, Andy Malcolm, Joe Cole, Syd Bishop, Peter Brabrook, Alan Dickens, George Horn, Eric Parsons, Robert Bush, Scott Parker, Yossi Benayoun, Jim Frost and John Sissons.

Strikers: David Speedie, Len Goulden, Billy Bridgeman, Demba Ba, Joe Payne, Clive Allen, George Hilsdon, Carlton Cole, Billy Brown, Jimmy Greaves, Pop Robson, Billy Williams, Ron Tindall and Bob Deacon.

Bobby Gould played for West Ham and went on to be assistant and caretaker manager of Chelsea. Ron Greenwood and Gianfranco Zola played for Chelsea and managed West Ham, while Sir Geoff Hurst and Dave Sexton both played for the Hammers and managed the Blues. Avram Grant has managed both clubs.

Today’s focus though is on an Academy graduate who started his career at Upton Park before becoming a legend at Stamford Bridge. Frank Lampard Junior was born in Romford to West Ham left-back Frank Senior and Pat on the 20th June 1978, a month after the Hammers’ relegation from the top flight. He joined West Ham’s Academy in 1994, spent a spell on loan with Swansea in 1995 and won the South East Counties League in 1996, making the FA Youth Cup Final in the same year, although the Irons lost to Liverpool.

Lampard made his Hammers debut at the age of 17 on 31st January 1996 as a substitute in a 3-2 home win over Coventry; he made one further sub appearance in 1995/96 and made 16 appearances in 1996/97, although his season was ended by a broken leg suffered at Aston Villa in March 1997.

Lampard was a key figure in the Hammers’ ever-improving team in 1997/98, scoring his first goal for the club a minute after stepping off the bench on the opening day of the season, the winner in a 2-1 victory at Barnsley. Lampard made 42 appearances as the Hammers finished eighth, scoring nine goals, including a hat-trick in the League Cup fourth round against Walsall, who had future Hammer Jimmy Walker in goal. Lampard also scored the opener in a 3-1 defeat at Leeds’ Elland Road, replicating his dad’s jig round the corner flag at the same ground in the 1980 FA Cup semi-final by way of celebration. He made his debut for England Under-21s during this campaign, going on to captain the side.

Lampard made 41 appearances as the Hammers finished fifth in 1998/99, scoring six goals. Becoming renowned for spectacular strikes from distance, he notched long range strikes in home victories over Leicester and Middlesbrough, and also scored a penalty at Anfield’s Kop End in a 2-2 draw against Liverpool.

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Arguably Lampard’s best season in claret and blue was the 1999/2000 campaign, scoring 14 goals from midfield in 49 matches. He started the season in style, scoring four goals by the end of August – three in the InterToto Cup against Jokerit, Heerenveen and Metz, as well as the winner in a 1-0 home triumph against Tottenham. He also scored in the UEFA Cup against Osijek and bagged winners in Upton Park goalfests against Sheffield Wednesday (4-3) in November 1999 and Bradford (5-4) in February 2000. Lampard also made his full England debut under Kevin Keegan in October 1999, starting and playing 76 minutes in a 2-1 win over Belgium at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light – his cousin, Jamie Redknapp, scored the winning goal.

Lampard’s final campaign in east London, 2000/01, saw him bag nine goals in 37 games. He scored his only brace for the club in a 2-1 win at Bradford in February 2001 and signed off as a Hammer with three goals in his final four games. His last goal for the Irons was a penalty in a 2-1 defeat at Newcastle on 16th April 2001, with his final match for the club being a 2-0 home defeat to Leeds on 21st April 2001 – the visitors had 22-year-old Lampard’s youth team colleague Rio Ferdinand in their ranks. Lampard made his second and final England appearance while with the Hammers in Sven-Goran Eriksson’s first match in charge, as a half-time substitute in a 3-0 win over Spain at Villa Park in February 2001.

A few weeks later, Lampard’s father and uncle (Frank Senior and Harry Redknapp respectively) both left the club. Feeling that his position as a player at the club was untenable, Lampard sought a move and rejected Aston Villa to sign for Chelsea for £11m in the summer of 2001 – he had scored 38 goals in 187 appearances for West Ham United. My video below shows 37 of these 38 goals.

The 23-year-old Lampard made his debut for Claudio Ranieri’s Blues in a 1-1 draw with Newcastle at Stamford Bridge on 19th August 2001 and scored his first goal on 20th September 2001 in a UEFA Cup tie against Levski Sofia. His first league strike in a Chelsea shirt came in a 5-1 home win over Bolton in December 2001. 2004 saw Lampard named in the PFA Team of the Year for the first time in what would be three successive seasons. He was also voted England Player of the Year after his exploits at Euro 2004, in which he was named in UEFA’s Team of the Tournament, and won Chelsea’s Player of the Year award (which he would also win in 2005 and 2009).

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After Jose Mourinho took over in the summer of 2004, Lampard won the Premier League in successive seasons, as well as the FA Cup in 2007 (Lampard was Man of the Match in the Final) and the League Cup in 2005 and 2007. He was awarded FIFA’s Player of the Year Silver Award in 2005, a year which also saw him win the Football Writers’ Player of the Year prize and the England Player of the Year award for a second time. He won the Premier League and FA Cup Double under Carlo Ancelotti in 2010, scoring 27 goals in 51 appearances during that 2009/10 campaign. European titles came later in his Chelsea career, winning the Champions League in 2012 and the Europa League in 2013. He scored his last goal for Chelsea in a 3-0 home win over Stoke on 5th April 2014 and made his final appearance for the club at the age of 35 in a goalless draw with Norwich at Stamford Bridge on 4th May of the same year.

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Lampard left Chelsea in 2014 after 13 years at Stamford Bridge in which he had become the Blues’ highest goalscorer of all-time, scoring 211 goals in 648 appearances. He won three Premier League titles, four FA Cups, two League Cups, two Community Shields, one Champions League and one Europa League during his time in west London. He won 106 caps for England, scoring 29 goals for his country. He represented the Three Lions at the 2004 European Championships, and the 2006, 2010 and 2014 World Cups. He missed the 2012 Euros through a thigh injury.

Lampard spent a season with Manchester City before ending his career at New York City FC in the United States. Lampard, now 40, is currently manager of Championship side Derby.

Referee

The referee tonight will be Christopher Kavanagh. The Manchester-born official has refereed the Hammers on six previous occasions, most recently for our 2-0 home win against Newcastle, a game in which he awarded the Hammers a penalty for a foul on Chicharito which was converted by Mark Noble. He had previously been in charge for our 2-2 home draw with Brighton in January, our 1-1 draw at Huddersfield in November and our 1-0 home defeat to Wolves in September.

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Kavanagh was the man in the middle for our 2-0 win at Leicester last May and also issued Arthur Masuaku with a red card for spitting in an FA Cup fourth round defeat at Wigan in January 2018. He has been the man in the middle for 18 Premier League matches so far in 2018/19, issuing 61 yellow cards in those games and one red, and awarding four penalties.

Possible line-ups

Chelsea manager Maurizio Sarri is without Ethan Ampadu and Marco van Ginkel but Marcos Alonso, Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Pedro should all be available. The Blues could shuffle their pack with a Europa League quarter-final first leg trip to Slavia Prague coming up on Thursday. Chelsea have lost three home Premier League London derbies over the past four seasons, as many as they had in the previous 11 campaigns. However, the Blues are unbeaten in 12 league meetings with the Hammers at Stamford Bridge since a 3-2 loss in September 2002, winning eight and drawing four (the goals from this match can be seen in my video in the ‘Featured Video’ section of this site).

West Ham are winless in six league away matches, losing five, since a 2-1 victory at Southampton on 27th December. Manuel Pellegrini is without Winston Reid, Carlos Sanchez, Jack Wilshere, Andriy Yarmolenko and Andy Carroll – the Chilean has again suggested that Reid and Yarmolenko “will not be ready” to play this season, although Sanchez could be involved in “some games before we finish” and Wilshere played 66 minutes for the Development Squad yesterday. The Hammers should have Ryan Fredericks, Samir Nasri, Felipe Anderson and Marko Arnautovic available.

Possible Chelsea XI: Kepa; Azpilicueta, Rudiger, David Luiz, Alonso; Jorginho, Kante, Kovacic; Pedro, Higuain, Hazard.

Possible West Ham United XI: Fabianski; Fredericks, Diop, Ogbonna, Cresswell; Rice; Snodgrass, Noble, Lanzini, Anderson; Chicharito.

Enjoy the game – Up The Hammers!

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