West Ham UNITED vs City's Stars - Wed 1st Feb KO 19:45 London Stadium Fortress

OldCastleSwift

Huttonhammer said:

We get thrashed too often because we start games in the wrong mind set and make errors young kids make but well paid professionals should not make time after time.
There are far too many excuses being made by everyone at the club and not enough money being spent on better quality players.

Good point on the mind set Hutton. We looked far too anxious last night and we'd lost before the game kicked off, IMO. No composure and no shape at all. It was all a bit of a mess really.

Re the quality players, the right back situation is my biggest gripe. Byram was blown away last night but he has no cover and no competition. Really dropped the ball on that one

baracks_a_hammer

But Slav said he was happy with what he had, so it goes back to him and his judgement of players and not the daves, right?

NEoldiron

Alderz, for me Snodgrass and Kouyaté in for Feghouli and Noble.

Yeoldhammer

Team didn't do what Everton did to City and Slav admitted this on the OS. Slav needs to start going to other games (obviously when we are not playing) or watching other teams. Everton beating City was textbook stuff and we did nothing to even remotely replicate what they did.

Lukerz

All we did was participate in that game. Nothing else.

I have no problem being beaten 4-0 by the better side, but all we did was make up the numbers.

And to have learnt nothing from the game 3 weeks ago...was almost the game played back on record.

Lukerz

The only positive is that we got beat 1-0, 2-0 and 5-0 in consecutive games over the near year and responded with 3-0 and 3-1 wins so hopefully we'll do smiles at the Saints.

OldCastleSwift

baracks_a_hammer said:

But Slav said he was happy with what he had, so it goes back to him and his judgement of players and not the daves, right?

Absolutely.

The only caveat to that is that it was more that there were no right backs available to improve the first XI, which I would suggest was budget-driven rather than anything else.

thornburyiron

It's a good job we have an ex full back as one of our coaches because just think how bad our full backs would be without his guidance.

baracks_a_hammer

OCS

I honestly don't think the Dave's were withholding dosh (although clearly I have no proof either way!)

The only exception to this, I believe, was Defoe where they weren't prepared to go to 8 figures because of a lack of resale value.

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

baracks_a_hammer said:

But Slav said he was happy with what he had, so it goes back to him and his judgement of players and not the daves, right?

Surely not baracks, I thought it was obvious Slav was reading from a SUGO prepared script every press conference?

;whistle

Lukerz

If Slav thought our squad was fine, you'd have to question his ability to take us forward long term.

OldCastleSwift

We were looking for a right back. That's been clearly stated by the manager. So there was obviously an acknowledgement that there is a requirement, just not necessarily the funds to get the player we wanted.

baracks_a_hammer

I thought I'd let someone else post this sort of thing first, Luke, and was gonna pop something on the Slav thread to this effect..

IronHerb

Slaven_A_Laugh_Lukerz said:

If Slav thought our squad was fine, you'd have to question his ability to take us forward long term.

So why wasn't this questioned on Tuesday? ;hmm

baracks_a_hammer

OCS

Was it cited as a "funds" issue re the r/b.

I don't remember this but perhaps I am wrong

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

Man city have scored as many goals at the LS as WHU did in their first 4 months there

;weep

brookingsirons

Sorry to say and I have said this before cresswell is great going forward but no good
the other way he gets caught all the time specially against the better teams .

Put it this way he has been poor this season since his injury , we need class at right back and left back the pressure on read and fonte was terrible I felt sorry for them .

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

OldCastleSwift said:

We were looking for a right back. That's been clearly stated by the manager. So there was obviously an acknowledgement that there is a requirement, just not necessarily the funds to get the player we wanted.

We're skint!! (Effectively)

Lukerz

My view is that I expect 0 transfers in the summer as why will six months change what Slav thinks of the squad? If it's good enough now, it's still good enough in a few months? We'll have Carroll, Sakho, Fletcher and maybe Antonio and Ayew as striker options. We'll have Enner back too. We'll still have Byram, Arbeloa, Nord and Antonio as RB options. Plenty of cover?

We lost, this window, Arbeloa, Tore, Payet, Oxford and Zaza. We also lost Ogbonna to a season ending injury. All six of those have been in matchday squads this season. We signed Snodgrass and Fonte. From purely a numbers perspective, we have reduced the squad by four first team players. We also lost Kouyate and Ayew, but I appreciate that was only temporary. That's without even mentioning Masuaku and Sakho being long term absentees.

If Slav is happy with the squad, genuinely can look in your eyes and say that, he needs to have his position considered.

baracks_a_hammer

I'm going to throw this hand grenade out there and put my tin hat on:

Where do people think Byram would be in his development had he been coached by our former manager?

brookingsirons

Good point ;biggrin probably in the Dev squad still

Moore_than_a_nick

alderz said:

On Reid's position, he has always played on the left of the pair for us when partnered with Collins, Tomkins and Faye, it's only when he's paired with Ogbonna that he moves to the right. IMO, the move back will help him ;ok

Thanks for the facts, Alderz. I wonder if Reid prefers playing on the right, though. Remember he used to play right back. Perhaps he played on the left when we didn't have a left-footed CB because he's just better and more adaptable than that list of partners you mention. Anyway, while I think Reid's really excelled over the last season and a half, hopefully after a bit of adjustment, he'll excel just as much on the left. There was a point in the match last night where I thought he came way over to the right and went for the same ball as Fonte. Like any partnership, it will take time to gel. Also Fonte's not played any matches for a month or so, right? Looking for some reasons to be cheerful...

puddleglumhammers

Pat Nevin's point that playing 2 up top played into their hands. On paper they only had 1 holding midfield player, Tore, but the pace of closing down by De Bruyne, Silva, Sterling and Sane meant we were swamped in midfield. We could have gone with Noble, Obiang and Fernandes in midfield and maybe won more of the ball.

baracks_a_hammer

Has anyone else seen the rumour that cressers may be landed with a 4 game misconduct charge for aiming a punch at sterling??..

IronHerb

I think he did, and what's more I think he missed. ;doh

tomkinsworldclass

alderz said:

It's a lack of concentration from certain players that we didn't really see under BFS. I think that suggests that our defensive coaching isn't working as well as Slav would like

It's the difference in style, philosophy and ambition. A good example would be Carl Jenkinson- under BFS, he received alot more protection, the game was much more simplified and overall he had a decent season. Under Slaven in a more attacking, technical ,ambitious side when the skill set and decision making are much more important and advanced (less protection, etc, etc) he was pretty terrible. But its not about comparing like for like with BFS and all that stuff; its about learning from the game, because MCFC were superb, and as club learn from this season because theres alot of things at play influencing this season.

Its never nice to take a heavy defeat but MCFC have a very difficult style to play against when they are in good form, especially when you have to chase the game. In hindsight, I think Slaven would chance to a back 3 but I can understand what and why he made the decisions he did-especially without Kouyate and Sakho who are exactly the kind of players needed in this type of game. The goals were avoidable but symptomatic of MCFC's difficult style because the pressure they put on you and the positions they are then in to then capitalise on it.

There are certain things which, as a team and individually, you have to do against MCFC because everyone knows how they are going to play and what they will and wont do, but its very difficult in practise; for example, you have to get MCFC turning and facing their own goal to take them off the front foot and influence their pressing game- Cresswell should've always been opening his body and playing it down the line (which he should've done for the 1st), but instead he was tryign to play too much and passing back into the press. We have to learn from it, not so much to play how they play, but more so about trying to be more deliberate in how we go about things and the structure we want to implement but that can only really come with committing to long term values and building around the manager.

puddleglumhammers

Good post Tomkins. That's why I said 3 in midfield, to protect Byram and Cresswell a bit, which Fegouli and Lanzini failed to do.

tomkinsworldclass

Puddle, ;thumbsup I would've liked to have seen Lanzini drop in to make a 3 alongside Nobles and Obaing, and then fegholi higher up so we could press much more aggressively but with a bit more protection. Bless Noble, but he was chasing shadows last night ;lol

TwistandShout

Slaven_A_Laugh_Lukerz said:

If Slav thought our squad was fine, you'd have to question his ability to take us forward long term.

Id agree with that if that was the case.

But in my opinion his hands have been tied by the board.
(Just my opinion, i have no inside info, just what i believe)

Vorselaarhammer

;sofa

West Ham conceded 4+ goals in 3 of their last 106 games at the Boleyn Ground.

They've equaled that in 12 PL games at the London Stadium.