Don’t Tease Me This Way: Summerville’s Spark Propels West Ham To Unlikely Victory

Sometimes you have to wonder what is going on inside a coach or manager’s head when they make their team selections. With Mohammed Kudus starting his red card suspension, the world and his wife were confident that Crysencio Summerville was the obvious natural replacement to fill his boots. But Julen Lopetegui had other ideas and decided that playing Carlos Soler out of position on the left hand side was a far more sensible and insightful solution. Does he consider Summerville too direct for his particular brand of slow build-up football? And doesn’t Soler deserve an opportunity in the Lucas Paqueta position to do himself justice? After all, the Brasilian is rarely at the races these days.

The other changes from the drubbing at Tottenham saw a recall for Lukasz Fabianski in goal, Dinos Mavropanos replacing Jean-Clair Todibo at centre back and Edson Alvarez ousting Tomas Soucek in midfield. The unbalanced nature of the starting lineup instinctively looked liked poor judgement. But it did allow the coach to take the plaudits when he fixed his own mistake with three substitutions at half-time. Perhaps it was the plan all along to start with a duff formation in order to demonstrate the genius of his tactical use of substitutes later.

The first half ably demonstrated the folly of both selections and tactics. The team lacked any sense og cohesion, control or goal threat. What’s more, the persistence with the use of inverted full backs, the high defensive line and the uncertainty of how the defensive midfielders should fill the resulting gaps allowed Manchester United to pick off the Hammers at will through simple balls over the top. Time and again the Hammer’s defence found itself exposed by the simplest of all plays. A deficiency of organisation and tactics rather than personnel.

It is always easy to speculate on should-haves and could-haves in football games depending on what story you are wanting to tell. Not all the chances that the visitors created were gilt-edged, but a couple were more than presentable – especially the comical Dallo miss and the Fernandez header. Had West Ham found themselves two or three goals down at the break, there could be no complaints that it didn’t reflect the balance of play.

It was a different story after the break. The introduction of Summerville was the catalyst for change. His energy and single-mindedness at driving at the Red Devils defence inspired his team-mates and the crowd. All of a sudden, the Hammers looked like a team with purpose, One that was prepared to ask questions of its opponent. Todibo speed, awareness and positioning also gave the defence a more solid feel. He looks to be a very good signing – whoever would like to claim the credit for that one! Tomas Soucek did OK without being influential. I would like to have seen Soler moved centrally for a while although he doesn’t have the same aerial abilities as the Czech.

As the second period progressed, it was West Ham who looked the more threatening even if it was manifested in enterprising approach play rather than the creation of scoring opportunities. When the opening goal came there was a touch of good fortune as Danny Ings scuffed shot became a perfect set up for Summerville to slot home. His joy at scoring was obvious despite the yellow card shown for removing his shirt. It is good to see that the officials have a handle on the most serious issues apparent in the game – such as this and delaying the restart for a nano-second. While blatant diving, cheating, time wasting and other dark arts go unpunished.

Another piece of officiating that provides a solution to the wrong problem is forcing a player who has had treatment to leave the field until the referee sees fit. Of course, it is meant to discourage fake time-wasting injuries by Arsenal, but was there really any suspicion that Alvarez had faked a ball crashing into his face? I believe he was still off the pitch when Manchester United equalised – an equivalent situation that Ten Hag had complained about the previous week. We should, however, acknowledge the achievement of Alvarez in lasting the full 108 minutes without incurring a single yellow card

The circumstances surrounding the West Ham winner have overshadowed much of the reporting on the game. I doubt that many watching the game in real-time had seen anything untoward in the brief goalmouth skirmish and it came as quite a surprise when the game was stopped, and the referee directed to view the pitch-side monitor. In the days of VAR, we have become well aware how subjective these penalty calls are, allowing pundits and commentators alike to waffle on incessantly about whether there was contact and whether it was ‘enough’ – presumably measured in Newtons per square metre. How much is enough is never fully explained and we must await development of the AI powered degree of contact test before it can be resolved. It is rare for a referee to go to the monitor only to disagree VAR. I’ve a sneaking feeling by the time taken by David Coote to review the five seconds of footage that he was not convinced with. But he knew better than to incur the wrath of Michael Oliver. It is said these things even themselves out over time – so, just another dozen or so dodgy decisions in our favour and our account will be back in balance.   

Jarrod Bowen dispatched the spot kick with aplomb and after that there was just 15 minutes of added time to cope with. Bowen was another who came to life in the second half and his run was instrumental in the opening goal. His corner kicking is terrible though and generally results in a gentle chip into the keeper’s arms.

Summerville was the obvious choice for man of the match (or man of half a match) but I thought Aaron Wan-Bissaka was outstanding throughout. A good shift also from Michail Antonio who can still unsettle defences with his physical presence under the right circumstances, as long as you don’t try to involve him in any quick, intricate passing movements. Well done also to Fab for a sound display of goalkeeping – and not forgetting Mr Oliver. COYI!