West Ham Till I Die
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Nigel Kahn’s Column

Entertainment versus Result

*The Predictor League for Stockport is open. Enter your team HERE. Deadline is Monday at 6pm."

The crowds at West Ham haven’t been rewarded by results, but they keep turning up because of the good football they see. Other clubs will suffer from the old bugbear that result’s count more than anything. This has been the ruination of English soccer

Ron Greenwood’s quote is possibly the nearest definition you will see to explain the mystery of The West Ham Way, though for me what you think is the W.H.W is actually personal to you. It Is what you think it is. Ron’s quote is my mantra though for this.

Why do we watch football? What is it you want to see? Is it just to see your team win or is it to be entertained? Do you hope that in being entertained by your team they will win?
If your team plays well but loses how do you take it? What if the game you watch is frankly as dull as ditchwater do you celebrate the victory as if it was a fantastic achievement or do you shrug your shoulders and say, thank Christ we won that but god it bored me.

Is the result all that matters?

Sometimes you get asked why you go football. My answer is always "To be entertained and then to see my team win that game. I’d rather watch a 4-3 defeat than ground out 1-0 win that was won with a lucky goal. I will naturally welcome that lucky win but I won’t go overboard and celebrate it and when asked I will say what I thought of the game. This is exactly how I felt after our latest victory away at Everton and in one of the many WhatsApp groups I seem to be in I said the same thing.

“Who cares. We won.” was the reply.

That is a good question actually, because who does care if it is a dull game as long as we win? Do you?

I’m genuinely interested in your reply to this question, as I’d like to see if I am alone in wanting to be entertained watching football. So leave your thoughts in the comment section, (keep it short though JC JR). I have attached a screenshot of the conversation and I have removed the names to protect the innocent, oh, and the swear words but you can get the drift.

My reaction is not a criticism of the manager, nor his tactics, but just generally I found the game to dull, lacked any major attacking chances as both defences seem to have the better of the opposition attackers. Our goal was fortunate in the way it was contrived. The deflection could have gone anywhere, it was just lucky for us it fell to Soucek.

I stand by my answer in the text if for you the end result is all that counts. Save your money, don’t bother watching the game, just tune in to final score and the BBC will tell you the result, you can even text me if you have my number, though the reply won’t be blacked out in all the right areas.

Yesterday I received a text that shook me, and frankly thinking about football at this moment while is a great distraction, seeing what my great friend & his family are going through right now makes this even seem trivial.

I received another message from a podcast listener who I have a lot of time for, a young lad who told me his mate, a fellow from the Town you could say had passed. I didn’t know his friend, John, but I know he was well thought of by his friends. He was a regular at West Ham and I’d like to offer my condolences to his friends and family.

When we get back to football, whenever that be, it may be that when we look round we notice seats empty that were always full.

I hope the club remember those we have lost along the way in a fitting way.

Lastly, get well soon to my mate Doddsy and his wife who it seems have been struck down with Covid. “Be strong my handsome.”

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