Brighton (H) - 27/12

Cuz1

Fifteen minutes to go was crying out for benrahma but not for blinkered moyes, we were awful today and he should come out and take the blame instead of hiding behind the draw and saying how much character weve shown and coming from behind twice, I’ve said he doesn’t convince me he’s good enough for the job today proves a little more he’s not

alderz

Pengeman said:

Two points dropped because of poor first half and wrong personnel selection. The problem is that we don't the pace for a 4-4-2 and often lack creativity for 3-5-2. Bowen works hard but looked jaded. Surely, Moyes can't play Rice, Soucek and Noble in the same team.

Bowen, Rice and Soucek have started 15 games each this season. Rice and Soucek have played every minute. We have to change our formation when our LWB is out, and our gameplay relies on Antonio being on the pitch as we don't have anyone who can play his role.

This is what we mean by lack of depth. You can't expect Rice and Soucek to play in a 2, usually up against a 3, every single minute of every single game, all season long.

Bowen is a weird one though. He's obviously going to look jaded when he's played so much football. But Yarmolenko, Lanzini and Benrahma have 2 starts between them in the league this season. Moyes needs to shuffle his pack a little bit every now and then to keep at least a few players fresh.

As an aside, the next game against Southampton is a big one in our season now. A win could put us above them, a loss would put us 6 points behind them. If we want a top half finish we need to be getting results around now, otherwise it's going to be a season of upper bottom half.

Fortuneseeker

Don Hutchison from the BBC website -

Brighton deserved something out of the game, and West Ham need work on the training ground. David Moyes has improved a lot of players but he has to work on Seb Haller who was anonymous.

It's a fair question about West Ham's approach. If West Ham had been more aggressive and played some of the attacking players they had on the bench from the start it may have been different.

The draw doesn't really help either side. For West Ham it's a nothing result.

Manager got it wrong from the start, very disappointing result. Don't respect the point as our aspirations should have been/be better than that. If GSB are happy to for us hang around the middle of the table then the sooner they leave the better. The Aston Villa owners certainly aren't and look what they have achieved so far this season.

OutcastLondoner

MIAHammer said:

alderz said:

Deanscaleshammer said:

We seem to miss Antonio and Masuaku dreadfully.

Which is basically what everyone said all throughout the transfer window, and yet the club decided not to do anything about it.

I might be wrong but to be honest I don’t recall Masuaku being discussed as critical to our success during the transfer window It wasn’t until we changed formation and started to get some results that he became so crucial.

A lot of us said left back was critical to address in the sense that, when playing a back 4, neither Cresswell nor Masuaku looked good enough. And there was plenty of time before the deadline when we had switched to the back 5 and realised it was important to have a back up for Masuaku.

I think our chase for a CB was the wrong priority and I don’t know why we signed Benrahma when he doesn’t seem to be in the plans

Slacker

Lukerz said:

To he fair though, that second goal should not have stood

You can rule it out for the blatant shirt tug or the handball, your call

The shirt pull was so blatant how could they not see that?

MIAHammer

I actually quite liked the look of Lanzini when he came on today. Looked like he had a little fire in his belly.

ASLEFshrugged

I suppose a draw against Brighton was predictable no matter what the starting XI was but at least we now know what happens when we try to play Bowen and Haller in a front two.

We're still 10th although we would drop to 11th if Wolves beat Spurs.

Hamstew

Haller is dreadful.

steve

Just might take 11th if Wolves beat spurs

IronHerb

thornburyiron said:

We are heading for a relegation scrap again if we keep playing like this. Absolutely shocking.

22 draws will keep us up. We won't be relegated for crying out loud.

alderz said:

Jorderz_Moyes_will_be_Moyes said:

Rice has been awful.

Soucek too

Our MOTM Soucek imo. And that is why Fornals is so important for us. He does a lot of the fetch and carry work in midfield. Today Rice had to cover for Noble as well as do a lot of the fetch and carry.

Cuz1

I’d take 11th season ends

OutcastLondoner

IronHerb said:

thornburyiron said:

We are heading for a relegation scrap again if we keep playing like this. Absolutely shocking.

22 draws will keep us up. We won't be relegated for crying out loud.

alderz said:

Jorderz_Moyes_will_be_Moyes said:

Rice has been awful.

Soucek too

Our MOTM Soucek imo. And that is why Fornals is so important for us. He does a lot of the fetch and carry work in midfield. Today Rice had to cover for Noble as well as do a lot of the fetch and carry.

I think I’d like to see Lanzini or Benrahma start against Southampton though, rather than Fornals. We should keep the back 5. Second half looked better than we have with a back 4 IMO.

IronHerb

But then you run the risk of being overrun in midfield.

Dodger58

Fornals should be used to rotate with Rice and Soucek, then Benrahma or Lanzini with Bowen and Antonio (when fit). Focus should be on an Antonio alternative.

Dodger58

I thought Johnson did better second half, played further forward and gave us an option - although some of his colleagues appeared reluctant top,at through him on several occasions.

IronHerb

We could probably play a back 4 with Johnson at LB.

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

I agree RE Johnson

Given he isn't a naturally left footed player, thought he looked good today

Hes not Masuaku, but that's ok, he was strong in the challenge, ran the line well and showed a willingness to get forward

Would like.to see him given another opportunity in that position

Fortuneseeker

A couple of BBC pundits were saying yesterday that if you give DM time he will build a good team but I reckon it will be with his choice of players. It looks as if he doesn't want or rate Benrahma and he is only here because of the fall out over Diangana going. If he had gone sooner we would probably have got Eze instead as the funds weren't available when his move was completed to Palace.

IronHerb

Watkins was the miss.

ASLEFshrugged

We've played eleven times with 3 CBs and 2 WBs, it got us 18 pts.

We've played four times with a back 4, just 4 pts and we've not managed a clean sheet.

Risking being overrun in midfield seems to work well for us

Fortuneseeker

IronHerb, yes I agree but we were never going to pay £28 million plus for him were we?

BubblesNeverDies

IronHerb said:

Watkins was the miss.

Especially when you compare what he gives you with what Haller does and also what each of them cost. He's also scored 6 in 12 games.

baracks_a_hammer

We were going to pay £30m plus for tarkowski though? So some funds must have been there

claretandbluesky

There are not too many matches that the poor performance can fall quite so squarely at the managers door, but that was one. Just like any player the manager must be allowed to have a bad game now and again, but he must learn from it.

We did however experiment and we did find out some things for sure
Noble is not a starter
We need to play three at the back
Haller is a passenger
Yarmolonko needs a chance.
If you need unlock a defence don't leave Benrahma on the bench for the whole match.

As regards Brighton I thought they were the worst team we have played so far and a cert for relegation. A decent side would have taken us apart today. In the first half we were so poor I was just thankful we already had points on the board as I thought if they are doing this to us we look relegation candidates.

IronHerb

ASLEFshrugged said:

We've played eleven times with 3 CBs and 2 WBs, it got us 18 pts.

We've played four times with a back 4, just 4 pts and we've not managed a clean sheet.

Risking being overrun in midfield seems to work well for us

And I think Fornals has played in most, if not all, of those 11 games.

Fortuneseeker

baracks, are the funds still available for us to spend in January?

baracks_a_hammer

Fortuneseeker said:

baracks, are the funds still available for us to spend in January?

Probably not once we complete the Benrahma permanent signing

Poor planning though. The lwb position should have been known about for a while

And Haller was already falling out of favour post lockdown and even though Antonio was on fire as a c/f he is always a cert to miss a big chunk of the season

Even hugill was sold under these circumstances. You really couldn’t make it up

IronHerb

We don't pay for Benrahma until the summer, but we won't be active in the January window.

Fortuneseeker

baracks, speculate to accumulate. Earn extra money from finishing higher up the Premier League by making some new signings & that will help to pay for Benrahma. They used that approach with Soucek, got him in on loan and paid the fee once we were safe with the Premier League price money?.

baracks_a_hammer

We took the plunge on soucek and in particular Bowen as our PL status was in very real danger.

Sully has never been one to use Jan to kick on after a solid start and I don’t see it being different this time round.

With our budget (which must be v limited I would have thought), Moyes hopes of landing “another Antonio” seem to be very unlikely IMO.

I wouldn’t be surprised if we see no new striker at all. We will then I guess trot along in the second half of the season in the hope that Antonio can give us a run of a dozen consecutive games or so.