2022

Obviously I write this with a bit of disappointment, but I’ll try and give it a go.

First up, we probably put out our best side, with a patched up Zuma back in defence. No Coufal, which probably doesn’t bode well for him in the summer if Johnson is ahead of him.

Anyway, our biggest game for 46 years, home in a European semi. Exciting as it gets. Accompanied by my wife. We are playing a team mid table in an arguably worse league. Easy win for the Hammers right ? Yeah, Barcelona aren’t the team they once were……… We are massive…………… Light show, Fireworks, Tifo’s from both side pregame. This is what it all about……………”record scratch noise“

One nil down in under a minute. This is not the script we were looking for. A really simple cross and finish in under 60 seconds could take away our whole season.

And then we huffed and puff and were probably the better team in first half, and Antonio’s long overdue goal after the longest 20 minutes in football history put us back on an even keel.

Bowen had a chance earlier having been put straight through but popped it onto the post. Painful.

Anyway one one at half time and everyone is talking about 3-1’s and all sorts.

Not to be , within 10 minutes our German visitors strolled though our back line again to score the decisive goal in this leg. Kamada was excellent throughout the game and just found himself in the right place from an Areola parry.And after that they controlled the game and exhibited excellent game management to get the game over the line.

Bowen had a chance with an overhead kick going off the bar in the dying seconds. That may have been harsh on the visitors, but I would have taken it.

It would be remiss of me not to mention the away support. Despite the horror stories flying around about the visiting fans on social media, I thought they were fantastic, and they made the atmosphere ramp up another few percent ! Might be a few fines coming their way for flares, etc but fair play to them.

So we now have to condense our whole season down to 90 minutes away from home with a one goal deficit. Some players need to step up. Fornals was quiet, Souchek and Antonio were wasteful and Declan was frustrated and maybe seeing the gulf between his team mates and the opposition (and his team mates and himself?). Quick shout out to the much maligned Said Benrahma. He looked amazing when he came on and just clipped the post with a long range effort. More of this please.

Put the kids out against Arsenal this weekend, and rest up for next week. It may mean no European football at all next year but when will we get this chance again? We seem to play better under pressure so lets ramp it up !

MOTM (Kamada – Frankfurt)

WHUFC 1 Newcastle 1 EPL 2021/22 19/02/2022

With 2 key players out for the recently better performing opponents, and us pretty much back to full strength, we could have taken this game by the scruff of the neck and started to hold off those with games in hand.

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West Ham United 0 Dinamo Zagreb 1 Europa League 2021-2022 09/12/2021

With us through to the last 16 of this tournament already and a mounting injury list it was quite pertinent last night to make sure that we protect the first team squad for our trip to Burnley at the weekend. To that end we had a back four of Longelo, Ashby, Baptiste and Alese. Perkins started up front and the usual European stalwarts of Yarma, Noble, Kral, Areola, etc filled out the team. I was not too happy with both Noble and Kral starting. I understand the need to protect an inexperienced back four, but 2 deep holding midfielders at home seemed a little too negative.

For what ever reason, the away support was somewhat small (about 100 ?) so they looked a little odd in the vast away section.

They were in good voice, and that only got better when after 3 minutes Zagreb took the league when Orsic fired in a worldie from way out on the left, which left our keeper flat footed.

And literally the game ended there and then. Both teams huffed and puffed without any end product. We were lacking a push forward due to the defensive nature of the midfield. Benrahma came on for the second half and again was unproductive, which is getting a little worrying. Yarmalenko was poor even by his own standards. I was proved correct with the holding midfield experiment. Both Noble and Kral wanted to almost play sweeper, and the gap between front and back was stretched leaving Fornals and Benrahma covering quite large areas.

But all the youngsters, bar one, played well. Alesi and Baptiste looked very comfortable at the back and seemed to be able to deal with the longer balls coming in, and were good passing out. Maybe they could improve on actually bringing the ball out just 10 or so yards before passing, which would help to push the midfield on. Ashby and Longelo looked like modern fullbacks, full of running forward and not scared to take on the opposition. I thought Perkins was pushed off the ball easily, and will need to toughen up. He was partnered was Yarma for most of the second half but still seemed to give the ball up.

So we round off with a group round loss (and half a million worse off) but happy to qualify. Who’s next? Barcelona ? Dortmond ? Rangers ?

MOTM for me was the Zargreb no 7, Ivanusec. Ran the game at both ends from start to finish.

Just before we entered the stadium I thought I lost my keys. This meant I had to go back through security. Due to the cold I actually had a light jacket under a winter coat. Keys were found in the lighter jacket. Good news ! I re-entered the stadium and met back up with Aussie John. Turns out he had been in the club shop while waiting for me to return and in the process , had lost a glove. The irony was not lost on me, and I did have a chuckle. We are at that age. What happened this morning on my way to work ? Left my gloves on the DLR. Irony indeed.

Ronaldo confirmed to not be coming to East London

West Ham 1 Brighton 1 EPL 2021-2022 01/12/2021

A lot can be done in 3.5 minutes. You could drive 5 miles on a motorway. You could eat a Big Mac. You could go from Upton Park to East Ham on the tube. Or you could add another nail in the national game via the use of VAR.

The game probably had the right result and we go on, but this season I thought we had got rid of this drawn out nonsense happening in Stockley Park. Once again a corner comes in and we get it into the net through some bodies. No massive complaints from the opposition. And then it starts. Checking possible foul. To be fair it looked like (from a still) that Dawson had hands on a defender. Welcome to every corner in professional football. So that gets recinded. Then we take a look at a possible offside, another 2 minutes. I’m sorry but this was brought in for clear and obvious errors and here we go again. The picture that was showed doesn’t even have Antonio offside and further reports have said that it’s unclear who it hit last. Absolute joke and the quicker they use this in an efficient manner the better.

Anyway a point is a point. I was not one of booing contingent at the end. Maybe some of our supporters need some history lessons, to paraphrase the oppositions manger after their recent draw against Leeds. We have no right to win every game and to be fair the way we played in the first half would indicate we could lose more than we win if we carry on like this.

Squad depth has played a part here. Out of our back 4, we played 2 out of position. I know Johnson has played on the left a few times , but now he is used to being on the right, he was getting turned regulary which then invites crosses. Zouma, being the better of the two centre halfs, has stepped into Ogbonna’s place but seems to have issues getting it out from defence at his feet, which is a massive part of his game. Hopefully Cress is fit for Saturday, but if not Masuako will have to start in left midfield to assist young Ben, as he did when he came on last night. Also Dawson has to go in favour of Diop. Although still lopsided we could have some pace to get us out of issues.

The game itself was pretty poor, similar in some ways to Wolves, where we were the better team without punishing the opposition. Antonio still looks tired, and despite his goal (from a corner ) Soucek was just tidy without any explosivity. The second half livened up somewhat, but we couldn’t put away our chances. And what a goal from Maupay for their equalizer.

Benhrama started again after being poor for a couple of games and carriedon in that vain for the first 20 minutes. Consistently giving the ball away, poor passing and zero decision making. He was replaced by Lanzini with 15 to go. Manuel harried, tackled ran past people, and generally upped out game. Surely he starts against Chelsea ?

Interesting to see what happens to Brighton afterwards as lobbing flares near a pitch cost us a one match attendance ban.

And it was cold. MOTM I’ll give to Maupay for the goal. Out takeaways are we need ot be more at it from the get go. Like we were against Liverpool . Chelsea up next and the crowd will demand a performance. Question is can the team deliver.

One to keep an eye on is the standing up situation. Where we sit the lower tier is just in front and if they stand it is difficult to watch the game. However they only stand when we are attacking and the guys in the back row have no option but to stand as there are 50 rows in front of them on their feet. However the loud bickering started yesterday, and I imagine will continue into the future. Sly digs and offhand statements never work out well so i’ll just be an interested observer in this debate.

WHUFC 0 vs Manchester City 0 (5-3 pens). League cup 4th round 27/10/2021

What a night, what a night.

The cold realisation after beating Tottenham that a few days later we would be back to face City in the League cup was not the most exciting prospect.

Pre game was fun, meeting up with a friend who has finally got his arse into gear to buy a season ticket. This was someone who I hadn’t seen for nearly 10 years and glad to say he is still in fine fettle.

For those that are interested, more change in the seats behind me for this game. Kids for a quid gave me the opportunity to have a family with 3 under 5’s (not them !) sitting behind me. Believe it or not they were better than the Surrey Train Squad of Genk and Rapid fame.

I fully expected lots of changes on both sides with City having a significant upper hand. No fun in that. And to an extent that’s what I got. Wholesale changes on both sides. Unfortunately, City’s second team had 3 players who played in the Euro 2020 final for England, with 2 more in the bench. We had Noble, Dawson, Lanzini, Yarma, Vlasic and Areola coming in, and Moyes saw sense enough to leave Rice and Antonio completely out of it.. Slight gulf in quality !

And it showed. City’s domination of possession (64% according to the BBC, I thought more) was precise, and smooth. Do they ever miss a pass ? But no cutting edge. Sterling had a couple of runs at Johnson, but was getting no change from a lad really making his way in this squad. I sort of get what people have been saying about City not having a striker now. Without that focal point they are relying on mistakes from the opposition. Not that Areola had nothing to do. Out of the 2 keepers he was easily the busiest, but handled everything with ease, and an agility that maybe has made Fab stand up and raise his game as well. One save from a Stone header would have been talked about for weeks if it was Ederson or Alisson. Keep it up Alphonse, the start is only round the corner.

With the odd bit of counter attack from us, the game followed the same pattern all night. City attack, we get the ball, and provide a poor pass back to them after a small amount of possession. But our defending was resolute. Johnson, as already stated played a blinder again. Dawson and Diop were solid and Cresswell was just Cresswell.

The only player who struggled was Yarmalenko, and I think that may have been due to the quick closedown at high quality from Stones and Ake. Also, he was a bit isolated meaning normally his best available pass was backwards, quite a way backwards. Lanzini was getting bounced about in the middle, but held his own just about.

As the second half went on we saw more of the ball and there were chances for Masuaku (who was good all night, for his first game in a while). Yarma had a clear opportunity taken away after some lovely interchange with Johnson.

We continued to apply pressure, post our subs, as Bowen, Fornals, and Benrahma came on and brought up the effort and creativity levels. Towards the end of the 90 Coufal came on for Lanzini and I assumed this was to take a penalty. And like that penalties were upon us.

Up steps Noble. No problem. Then Foden. Big problem as he lashes it wide. Then we go one for one with Bowen, Dawson and Cresswell getting ours . Our last penalty, and the one to win the match, I assumed would be taken by Coufal. And up steps Benrahma. The same fella who was shocking against Spurs and has shown to be very hot and cold. By this time my nerves are shredding. The stadium is silent. Both teams watch on……..

AND HE SCORES

And that’s that, time to get home. What a night !

What a night again. For the first time since the move, I felt like a fan again if that makes sense. Getting sucked into the drama, revelling in the atmosphere. The sheer joy of that last penalty. Having a sore throat in the morning !

MOTM Areola. Top man all night, made some big saves. Big shout out to Noble, who kept everything tidy, and Johnson, who based on the subs, kept a fit Coufal out of the team. Can he do the same away against Villa this Sunday?

Fireworks are not only for Europe people.

WHUFC 1 Tottenham 0 24/10/2021 EPL 2021-2022

First off , all back to normal on the seating front, with my European neighbours not in attendance (see Genk post) made the day a whole more enjoyable. And its always nice to get one over on the Totts, if nothing else just to chip away at the myth that they are a big club, which they held onto despite not beating us last season, and finishing below us in the league, and being part of the failed breakaway league with some real big clubs.

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WHUFC (2) vs Rapid Vienna (0) 30/09/2021 Europa League

Champions of Europe, you’ll never sing that !

European football is upon us for the first time in a few years and not in a qualifier. Last season got us straight into the group stages and tonight we were looking to keep our place at the top of our group, after beating Zagreb on the road 2 weeks ago.

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