The first day of a new season was rather surprisingly, full of optimism for the West Ham faithful, as we took our first steps back towards the top flight. Also the weather was spot on which was nice. We got to the ground rather late so headed straight to our seats, and what i saw surprised me. Cardiff had about 800 – 1000 in the North Bank, with about 4k empty seats. If this is the new way as Upton Park ,then excuse me while we piss money down the river. The top tier must of had 30 people tops in it.

Anyway the game. Gary O’Brien and Matt Taylor made their debuts alongside new captain Kevin Nolan. The line up actually looked really promising, except one thing. It’s a new season, and we need points, what we don’t need is one up front at home. I assume this was to accommodate the variety of midfielders at our disposal. We got going with our usual gusto and refused to actually shoot until after about 10 minutes. After 23 mins Scott Parker was clean through,  and showed his worst trait, the inability to shoot, when he has time on the ball. This is the difference between him and Lampard and Gerrard, and probably why he has never played at the very top level.

Cardiff offer nothing at all, but i do get a text telling me i am related to Don Cowie their number 8, something i have since followed up and now believe to be true !

Half time and we get the next Upton Park surprise. Beer now comes in plastic bottles for £3.80. Cheers.

We start the second half as we finished the first, but Cardiff seem to be getting into their stride. Tonka has one cleared of the line, and big Fred hits to post. Talking of Fred’s, young Mr Sears got about 20 minutes too long on the pitch. I will say this again, he really doesn’t have it and now he has also stopped taking responsibility for his game as well, e.g leaving balls for others, not getting back quick enough. If CC and big Fred had started together, we would of pissed that game.

One other person who was making a debut (of sorts) was Hertha Illunga. He actually seemed to link up will with Taylor (who was great all game), and look like the player of old. Until it rained. With a minute to go. And he fell over. And Kenny Miller scored on his debut. And we lost. Again.

SO, BFS gets a game rest due to rampaging 12 year olds on the street, and its Doncaster away next. 3 points ? I bloody hope so.

 

Its been a while since out last home game and the interveining time has produced two losses away, to Chelsea and Man City. This has left us bottom of the EPL and in a tricky situation t say the least.

So with the loveky weather i donned the holiday shorts ans hit the train for the penultimate home game against fellow strugglers Blackburn Rovers. Rovers brought their usual faithful of about 800 (how do these teams survive, its beyond me). The first half was pretty much one way traffic for WHU, but one decent attack from Blackburn allowed our defence to collapse, and Jason Roberts takes a nice poachers goal for one nil.

This frustrates the hell out of WHU and they go into the shell up into half time.

I said at half time that Freddie Sears has to come off, as he wasn’t getting involved and when he did he came off second best to the physicality of Rovers. He started, and carried on as he left off. With nothing happening the subs came in the shape of Robbie Keane coming on for the perinneal end of season appearance of Luis Boa-Morte. Freddie should of gone off then, plain and simple. Mistake one. Mistake two was moving Ba out to the wing to accomodate Keane, when he was the only one providing some incesive attacking. Carlton was having a bad game.

 10 minutes later Freddie did leave the field with Jacobsen for a last throw of the dice with the introduction of Big Fred and a welcome return for Jack Collinson.

Now with 4 centre forwards on we pushed on and a nice lay back from Carlton, found Der Hammer who rifled home from 10 yards out. This spurred us on massively, but Robbie Keane missed a tap in that looked like he actually pulled his foot back rather than tap it in. Watch the coverage and you decide. Conspiracy ? I don’t know but our friends in N17 would be more than happy with their little leprechaun helping us go down.

All in all a handy point but 3 was really needed. Wolves have since got 3 against West Brom to basically set us the target of 2 wins on the spin to stay up. Can we ? I have no idea, but we will find out in 7 days away at Wigan.

COYI for once

We really needed to bounce back after last week’s FA CUP defeat. A trip to high flying Spurs was not really what WHU needed, but those are the cards you are dealt.

Two footballing teams, a great pitch, and everything to play for for both teams in terms of points and excellent weather for football, all added to the possibility of this being a cracker.

We got a 0-0.

Not without incident though. Throughout the whole game Spurs had more possession but couldn’t do anything with it. Defoe had a couple of half chances in the first half, and Dawson hit the bar with a speculative effort from distance. WHU made up for their lack of ball time, with two efforts from Carlton Cole that another day would be put away. The first, he ran onto a lovely cross from Hitzelsperger, and put it over the bar. Then Ba put him in clear through on goal, and he decided to plough on into the keeper instead of taking it to his left, and slotting it away.

The second half was really a defending master class from West Ham mixed in with some luck. Defoe could have had 3 at least, and Green pushed a class free kick from Bale onto the bar, in the dying minutes.

In total Spurs had 24 shots and no goals (compared to 11 for WHU). Wayne Bridge got MOTM. Imagine how good he could be if he had a right foot!

Another point for the Hammers, means we are now in 15th. STOP THE LEAGUE !

I expected one point from Spurs and Man U at home. We have that, now we need 4 and get this relegation monkey off our backs.I really think Utd are there for the taking next week.

One week,after easily beating Stoke in the league, the intrepid hammers venture north to face the Potters again, but this time in the FA CUP, with a place at Wembley in the semis at stake.

WHUFC stayed pretty much the same with Obima coming in for Demba Ba. I was expecting the same level of commitment as last week, and another high tempo performance would of seen us through.

Stoke came out of the blocks on fire and pressured WHU back into their third. Green pulled of an amazing save from former hammer Etherington after just 2 minutes. West Ham could not get it together and payed the price, after another long throw from Delap is met by Huth,  it’s one nil Stoke.

Stoke kept the pressure on, and West Ham had no response. Then a  great ball from Hitzelsperger, found big Fred, and he bundled the ball in whilst being attacked by Huth. This caused uproar with the Stoke back line, claiming handball. I must say the jury is out, as i think he took it down with his shoulder.

Onto the second half, which was uneventful, except for Etherington diving to win a penalty, which was then saved by Green. Towards the latter end of the half, CC gave away a free kick on the edge of the box, and the resulting free kick gave Danny Higginbottom the winner after a wicked deflection from Rob Green’s hand.

Overall a poor performance from the Hammers who couldn’t get to grips with the negativity of Stoke today, and can now do their customary “concentrate on the league”. However, i have two further points to make.

The ref gave Stoke a penalty, for Etherington diving, and then missed Tompkins being thrown to the ground by Walters despite it being right in his eyeline. Refs take a lot of stick, some unjustified, but blatant mistakes like this make them an easy target.

Secondly, Stoke fans, fair play to you for the win, you were 10 times better than last week, BUT, how can you watch that crap every week. You all get excited about a thrown in for gods sake. Wouldn’t you like to see some semblance of the beautiful game on a Saturday ? I honestly think i would chuck in my season ticket the day that comes to Upton Park (or Stadio Strafordio).

The next two games are Spurs away and Man u at home. 4 points would see us safe for the time being but I am expcecting  a return of 1 and an exciting end to the season.

This could be considered the first leg of a double header with a place at Wembley and Premiership survival at stake.

Yet again, another freezing cold day, which i must admit is starting to get a bit wearing. But there was warmth in the hammers fans outlook, after our magnificant victory against Liverpool the previous week.

I watched Stoke – West Brom last monday, and thought that we should win easily as long as we keep it down and play our own style. The WBA game was one of the worst adverts for EPL football I have seen recently, and it was my conclusion was that a normally free flowing West Brom, tried to play Stoke at their own game, and it became a war of attrition.

Obviously thinking along the same lines, Uncle Avram had a regig to combat their most incisive weapon, the long throw. He played 3 centre backs in a flat back four, with James Tomkins replacing Jacobsen at right back.

Apart from the odd drift inwards, this worked well.Two other strategic changes also improved WHU’s chances against the stokies. One, playing 3 big lads up front. This kept Robert Huth busy with CC, and allowed Ba and big Freddie to drift in and out. Two, the WHU team appeared to be under instruction to take every free kick and throw in as quick as possible, to stop Stoke organising themselves against these dead ball situations. Something they are very good at.

Both changes and instructions gave Stoke very little time to organise and forced them into mistakes. The first major one was after 22 minutes when a speculative  through ball from Noble prompted a “no, after you” situation between centre back and goalkeeper,the outcome of which gave Demba Ba his fourth goal in three starts. 

6 minutes later Di Costa further cemeneted his place in the first team by rising well at the far post to nod the second in from a Hitzelsperger free kick. A couple of the guys i speak to over at the game, said they are amazed how much air he does get with his jumping, and after watching the replays on sky this morning i have to agree. there is definitley a Jordanesque quality to his aerial ability.

With the score at half time being 2-0, the game was all but over. The second half was not much to write home about, a few missed chances for both sides and an overall resignation that all the real game had happened in the first half.

With 7 minutes of normal time to go, Scotty makes a fantastic run down the right and into the box, to cut back a pass to big Freddie how hits it against the keeper. But it bounces out to Der Hammer who rockets one in from 8 yards, that without the net to stop it, could be in orbit around the ISS about now.

So now its 3-0, 6 points from the last two games, and + 5 for the GD. This pushes us out of the bottom 3 , as brum get bashed by WBA. According to my predictions we now only need 5 points out of 9 games. I may have to review this after brum have played their two games in hand.

Next week its part two of the Stoke – WHU world series (TM). A place at Wembley beckons. Before yesterdays game, we would of taken a win yesterday at expense of the cup, but we all left yesterday thinking another win next week is almost guaranteed. Time will tell.

Talking of leaving yesterday, idiots of the week award goes to the Met Police. Post the game we took our usual route via the back of the chicken run, and past the away exit. The police have cordened of this route and were directing WHU through the park. No probs, but there appeared to be some “light hearted banter” between the fans, that without the park fence could of been more interesting. So we walk into the park, and leave by the next exit so we can continue along our normal route. This takes us to ……….you guessed it…….. straight to the back of the Stoke fans behind the corden. Good call the Met………..

Fresh from our victory in the FA Cup we then meet the once mighty Liverpool FC at home six days later.

Our friends from the north come off the back of a tough midweek trip into Europe and as such were probably more tired than we were and therefore a perfect opportunity for WHU to get 3 more points and hope to stave off relegation.

I had predicted a draw, and it looked like going that way, until “Mr West Ham” Scott Parker popped up with a sublime outside of the boot finish to beat Reina. 1-0 WHU. I headed off to the bar for half time and post retrieving a watery beer from the bar, watched Demba Ba come into the box and exocet a header into the Liverpool net, after some great build up play. So 2-0 at half time and one forced sub for Liverpool, post Kelly pulling  up with a hamstring, and being replaced by a previous “Mr West Ham”, one Joe Cole.

The second half was a bit of a riot for WHU, barring the odd Liverpool incursion into our territory.  Then the old WHU curse struck and we left an easy ball in the box which then got squared to Johnson, who made it 2-1 with 6 minutes of normal times remaining.

Uncle Avram throws on Carlton for Ba, and presumably tells him “hit the corners, use your strength and run down the clock”. He does this precisely twice, and with the level of success he was getting, i think he changed tactics, and fancied his chances. Next time he gets the ball, he out muscles Carragher and gets into the box for a lovely low to the corner finish.

My prediction was for 11 points from 11 games. With this unexpected bonus, we now need 8 from 10, and Stoke at home on Saturday in an easily winnable game.

My jury is out on Ba. One of the Johns said he adds sparkle and unpredictability. I currently am of the opinion that he needs to be a bit more of a team player and he could elevate his game further. Carlton Cole is quietly turning into a cult hero and long may that continue.

Matthew Upson was allegedly out for the season and the played one of his finest 90 minutes in a WHU shirt. Special mention to Tonka, who was just magnificent and kept Suarez at bay all day long

Based on what i saw i would not blame Gerrard if he leaves,  King Kenny or not. Will Caroll add to Liverpool ? Not unless they change tactics completely. Jamie Carragher needs to retire and soon, but that is for another article i am currently planning, discussing the death of the English Centre Back.

Thanks for reading. Comments are welcome. Come on, be the first !

 

Apologies for the late submission, apparently paid work is important !

Another cup game, more high hopes for WHU, when really other more pressing matters should be at the forefront of our minds.

It was a bloody cold Monday night, and fair play to the Burnley hordes who braved the journey. I shouldn’t be surprised though as last year they had witnessed one of the best games ever from a neutral perspective, with West Ham being 5-0 up and hanging on at the end to win 5-3, when they could have just as easily lost 5-6.

So onto the game, and at stake a place in the last 8 of the worlds most famous domestic cup competition. I was happy to see Der Hammer, Mr Hitzelsperger in the side for his competitive debut, and was hoping he would slip in the hole allowing Parker to command the midfield from a deeper position. I was not disappointed. DH looked like he had been there all season, always the mark of a quality player. And then almost on cue he pops up with a trademark screamer from some distance out after i must say some pretty poor defending. 1-0 WHU !

Burnley looked a lot like us, all pretty football with no end product, and a poor defence. Talking of defence, Reid was useless again and for no good reason fell over in our box and nearly gave the ball to the opposition with in Greenie to beat. 2nd div at best.

So half time comes and goes and the game starts again with no big changes, its all a bit open and a bit rubbish to be fair. THEN….. Carlton scores another of his now trademark,”how did that happen” goals (see Wolves and Brum at home). He is offside, takes a great pass from Noble, first touch great, second touch straight to the keeper, collides with the keeper, gets the bounce (hints of handball), swing his tree like leg while on the ground and nutmegs the defender for 2-0.

No doubt about the 3rd, a blinding ball and long range finish from Carlton. By this time the other clarets had all but given up, but continued playing it around well.

The forth was a Reid header. Well taken header from a corner, but has the downside of meaning he probably has a place until Upson is fit again (end of season – Yikes !).

4-0 up and cruising , but it wouldn’t be WHU without a comedy moment. This week brought to you By 2 England players (currently ranked in the top 7 in the world). With his front to our goal Wayne Bridge allowed a forward to pressure him all the way to our goal. This really exposed the fact the man has no right foot. When about 4 ft from Rob Green he taps it to him. The whole crowd and our keeper were a little surprised, but the outcome brought no astonishment. Greenie tries to clear, miss hits it, straight to a Burnley player, who bounces it onto his mates head and its 4-1.

This brought about memories of last year again, but young Freddie Sears came to the rescue to take a nice poachers goal to make it 5-1, game well and truly over.

Stoke in the next round. Prediction: Draw up there, win at home, day trip to Wembley in the Semi’s

Liverpool this Sunday and i have no idea what will happen. It completely depends on which teams turn up, for both clubs.

I have lowered my points prediction down to 36 to stay up, meaning we have to get 11 points from 11 games. So lets start with a least one this weekend.

Following hot on the heels of our great victory against Blackpool on Wednesday, today saw our third meeting with Birmingham in nearly as many weeks. And after the 2 thrillers in the LCSF, this game was set up to pitch 2 jaded teams at the wrong end of the table against each other. And that is what was provided, 2 teams who knew each other inside out and really couldn’t be bothered.

We had little or no invention, although all of our January recruits got a shift, none really rose to the top. Although i will say Gary O’Neill looked twice the player Barrera ever will be. The jury is still out on Demba Ba, as he only got a few minutes at the end, he did look quick, and hit the post with about his second touch.

Scott Parker looked knackered and needs a rest. Over the last few weeks he has got worse and worse, and needs some time out if he is to get back to his best.

Winston Reid still looks a liability, and it was a shame Upson only had 45 minutes in him and kept Zigic quietly dominated.

Once again West Ham showed their Draculian qualities in having absolutely no ability in dealing with crosses. Every time the opposition get a corner, you can hear a pin drop within our fans. They really have to work on this in training, because Green is getting exposed nearly every time.

Today also left us bottom (again). We now need 16 points from 12 games. 5Wins and a draw. Away at West Brom next, a must win game, especially with their manager being sacked today (another travesty). Then its 13 from 11, and slightly more achievable (only slightly!).

On a stranger note, one of the clubs most recent legends, Mr Julian Dicks, was sat just behind me. No corporate seating for the Terminator. Club policy or JD’s, you decide …….

I awoke at an illegal for a sunday hour to watch Andy Murray get his nether regions issued to him in the Aussie Open final. That over with, i headed off to Upton Park assuming the same for WHU, a great promise of success cut down by an inability to perform at the required levels despite ability.

Looking at the team sheet scared me, not due to being a weakened team, but this could easy be a team next year in the Championship if we don’t pull our fingers out in the league. No, Parker, Cole, Upson, Tonka et al. In comes Kovak and Barrera, and Reid. It was good to see Jacobson back though. Green was made captain ahead of Noble which was weird, but i’m sure Uncle Avram had his reasons.

Forest came full of hope and the whole of the North Bank to cheer them on, so fair play to them. They are still a big club. God knows what we would be like if we had had their luck over the last 10 years.

Once again we come out of the blocks, and Obima scores after 6 mins by latching onto a wayward shot from Noble. Normally this season we would keep the lead until half time and then fall apart. Not this time, we gave up almost immediately, and after 18 mins Forest profited from our inadequacies. Yet again the defence was sieve like and just allowed them to bowl through. Also Adebola was fired up as his bullying was paying dividends.

Then just before half time we conceded again, as Greenie had to deflect out an Illunga clearance to an opposition player. Thinking this was just the beginning my mood was not getting better and then Big Vic had a cross / shot that went straight in, and its 2-2 at the break.

The second half was getting a bit uneventful until we got the correct decision of a penalty and after Vic and Noble had words, Vic took it and dispatched it with ease.

We then for a change dominated for the rest of the game and except a couple of small chances for Forest at the end we were comfortable.

According to the BBC the attendance was 29287. I would suggest 29289 as Kovak and Barerra were both spectators, and did absolutely nothing, and i mean nothing. Kovak got a move on towards the end, but  either of these two incompetent buffoons should never wear claret and blue again.

Talking of claret and blue, Burnley in the next round is a favourable draw at home.

I am looking forward to Crawley  – ManU more than our game to be honest.

One thing i did notice is that the best WHU podcast available; Stop Hammertime is now advertising in the ground. Which if you have heard the slaggings the team and board get, surprises me. Is it a case of money is money for WHU or have the SH team gone corporate ?

Stop Hammertime main page :http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7950250447