West Ham Till I Die
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Hammers unable to blunt the Blades - we have lost our way

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Well, I tried. I ditched almost all my matchday rituals this time. Didn’t wear a West Ham shirt. Didn’t drink out of a West Ham mug. I even missed the first eight minutes of the game as I was engulfed in conversation with my brother on the dog and bone. I didn’t even post COYI!!! on the matchday thread before kickoff. Still we could only get a 1:1 draw against Sheffield United.

The Blades looked a fairly decent side actually – and I doubt they will be anywhere near the relegation zone this season. They are a well organised team, well managed, well supported – I know that as a West Ham fan I probably should muster a modicum of vitriol and contempt against them, but honestly, I don’t. Not anymore, that is.

Before the game I thought the whole Tevezgate thing would impact not only our fanbase or the atmosphere inside the stadium, but especially my own view on the game. I have to confess, it didn’t. I just wanted us to get the win, not because it was Sheffield United but because we desperately needed a good performance and three points from this. Not such luck, me old china!

This time at least the effort was there. We played some neat football, we created numerous goalscoring opportunities – and wasted most of them appallingly in the process.
When Snodgrass finished a quick counter attack with a clinical shot to put us in front I thought this would set us up for the win. Wrong again!

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When, during the game, I was contemplating on what the focus in my article might be I briefly veered towards praising Roberto who indeed pulled off some wonderful saves in this game – until he let in the equaliser. I thought initially that a goalkeeper of his calibre could and should have easily saved that rather tame effort. The shot wasn’t that fierce, Roberto got down reasonably well, but suddenly appeared to be much shorter when he was stretching for the ball than what he looks like standing up. This is a tall bloke, after all. If he had saved it he would have earned himself plenty of praise for contributing massively to our win.

As it is so often the case with goalkeepers people will now focus on him letting in the equaliser. Rotten luck! As mentioned above, chances were there galore for us to keep the three points in London, but our decision making in front of goal is unconvincing. The chemistry isn’t quite there (yet), when it really matters in the opposition’s box.
Of course you can try and replicate those situations in training in the hope our conversion rate goes up when the next league fixtures come around.

On paper, the quality is there and while we are currently not in a position to field our best side we still should have won. 5 points from a possible 15 in our last five league fixtures is a disappointing yield, no doubt about it. I can’t put my finger on what exactly it is that’s wrong with our team, but Pellegrini and his staff better hurry up and find the problem and fix it. We all know how quickly the mood of a a fanbase can turn. Let’s hope for our next win lurking just around the next corner somewhere. COYI!!!

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Whenever as fans we are unhappy with a performance or a draw that should have been a win, let’s pause for a moment and think of those fans who are having the misfortune of seeing their club go out of business and get crossed off the fixture calendar in the middle of a season. This just happened to Wattenscheid 09, one of Germany’s most traditional clubs from a working-class background.

Wattenscheid is a borough of industrial town Bochum, located in the Ruhr Valley. Wattenscheid never oozed glory and glamour, neither the place nor the football club.
But it was good and honest football fare served for the local grafters, the miners, the dockers, the steelworkers. In the Nineties Wattenscheid were even playing in the Bundesliga top flight for four seasons in a row, after that they were a regular Bundesliga 2 side for many seasons before going on a downward spiral which led them to the German equivalent of League Two.

Now the club has run out of money, out of sponsors and out of luck. With a rather modest sum of €400K the club could have at least continued to play out the remainder of the season. Instead the club has now gone into administration, with all previous results of the season being eliminated accordingly. The club still have their youth team which may be their only hope now for the future, but their first team is gone and vanished for the time being. Sad.

Can you imagine, as a fan who maybe supported that club, not necessarily out of choice, but because it was the family thing to do, because your uncle or granddad took you there for your first game, to see your club disappear at short notice ? Their games that used to be a fixture of your weekend activities for years and decades, rain or shine, hail or snow, the matches you took for granted like the sun coming up every morning. And suddenly…NOTHING!

I have a lot of time for people supporting their local, traditional club, especially if they are not overly successful on the pitch and have suffered several relegations already.
To see those clubs go under, hitting their community hard in the process, is a terrible thing to witness. You don’t wish that on any fan.

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So, whenever you’re in danger of frustration or anger getting the better of you after a poor West Ham performance, just spare a thought for those fans who literally no longer have a club. At all. There may be plenty of things at West Ham we are not happy about, the stadium, individual performances, the board, away ticket policy etc.
But we still have a club to watch, to support, to root for and cry over. I reckon the Wattenscheid fans would be quite happy now if they could still be disappointed about their team only drawing 1:1 at home actually. They can’t. Their club has been taken away…

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Hamburg football update: Starting with Hamburg SV who made quite a statement by beating promotion rivals Stuttgart by a 6:2 scoreline. Top of the table, solid points cushion already, things are looking good for them right now, with the mood among the fanbase being the best it’s been for quite a while.
St.Pauli lost 1:0 away to Heidenheim, losing momentum in the process.

Mixed results from my beloved Concordia. My brother and nephew joined me for the first team home game, it was a terrible performance and a 2:4 defeat. Earlier the U23s had won their away game 7:0 to maintain mathematical touching distance to the promotion places.

And the women’s team only scored once (which is unusual), but it was enough for a 1:0 home win in their cup fixture, so they go through to the next round.

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