Geoff Hopkins

Matchday: Hammers v Black Cats

Looking forward with renewed enthusiasm as the Hammers take on the bedraggled Black Cats.

West Ham Sunderland Fresh from the encouraging win against Crystal Palace last weekend Hammer’s supporters will be looking for the same professionalism and panache as West Ham entertain lowly Sunderland at the London Stadium today. Without a win all season and just two draws in their account the visitors look almost as miserable as the look on their manager’s face. If ever a team reflected the manager’s personality on the pitch then it is the Black Cats.

David Moyes is Sunderland’s 13th manager (plus a couple of caretakers) this century and is the epitome of the dour Scotsman; like the one who has won the lottery and then admonishes himself for buying a second ticket. History would suggest that he won’t be at the Stadium of Light this time next year when in reality Sunderland need to stick with someone for a few years to sort themselves out. A biggish stadium does not make a big club and there seems to be a lot wrong at the club as their perennial struggles and unlikely great escapes implies.

“It was good in the camp two or three weeks ago. We didn’t stop training but of course it’s a better mood because the confidence is back, in a positive way.”

– Slaven Bilic

Anything other than a convincing West Ham win today will be a huge disappointment. We took four points off the Black Cats last season but were quite fortunate to do so; with the drawn away game hinging on a sending off after limply going 2-0 down and the home game a narrow and scrappy 1-0 victory. We need to see more of the high tempo, quick passing and movement from last week and avoid a return to the ponderous build up that has characterised the majority of the season.

Head to Head

Our Head to Head record with Sunderland was another which I believed would be firmly to our advantage when in fact it is almost level pegging. My instinct was that it this is a fixture where we routinely rattle in the goals but I guess that is merely the claret and blue spectacles playing havoc with my rear-view perception.

	P	W	D	L	F	A	Sequence
Home	42	18	14	10	79	50	WWDDLW
Away	44	13	11	20	54	71	DDWLLW
	86	31	25	30	133	121

West Ham have won three of the last six home fixture while the last Sunderland away success came in a 3-0 victory in the very final game of the woeful Avram Grant season.

Team News

By rights we should have been expecting an unchanged team from the previous match but, sadly, incompetent refereeing means that Aaron Cresswell sits this one out. Andre Ayew is back in training but remains some way away from a recall while the recuperation of Carroll and Sakho is following a ‘tomorrow never comes’ regime; it seems that we have devised a new position of the ‘False Substitute’ which will be making Pep very jealous.

Gaun yersel’, haud yer wheesht. Shut yer geggy, whit’s fur ye’ll no go by ye. Away an bile yer heid.

– David Moyes

I expect the starting line-up will be as last week, retaining three at the back, with Arbeloa coming in for Cresswell. It will not be as effective without Cresswell’s exceptional forward and link up play but is the best fit to build on the momentum of last week. I wonder what the odds are on Zaza to emulate Geoff Hurst and score 6 goals?

Sunderland will include pantomime villain Jermaine Defoe in their line-up. Still one of the best finishers in the Premier League I assume the defence are well aware that whatever else happens he mustn’t score.

Man in the Middle

Today’s referee is Robert ‘Bobby’ Madely from West Yorkshire. Madely was in charge of West Ham on three occasions last season including the fine wins away at Manchester City and at home to Liverpool. The other game, the 2-2 draw at Stamford Bridge, was less auspicious as his various blunders cost the Hammers another memorable away success. Madely is in fine yellow card form this season with 30 bookings from 6 games.

The Lawro Challenge – Week 9

A suspicion of foul play as the predictor battle with Lawro hots up.

Lawro Crystal Ball There is something very humbling in trying to come to terms with the fact that you are a worse forecaster of Premier League results than Lawro. In fact I am becoming quite suspicious of the current standings to the extent that I believe that my predictions may have been compromised by Russian hackers. There is still a long way to go but I need to consider whether or not I will accept the results once the counting has finished.

In Week 8, Rich scored seven points, Geoff four points, and Lawro narrowed the gap at the top slightly with eight points. This week’s predictions are below and show unanimous certainty that the Hammers will be three points better off at the final whistle on Saturday..

	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
Total after 7 weeks	60	45	50
Score in week 8	7	4	8
Total after 8 weeks	67	49	58

Predictions – Week 9
	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
SATURDAY
Bournemouth v Tottenham	2-2	1-2	1-1
Arsenal v Middlesbrough	3-0	4-0	3-0
Burnley v Everton	1-2	0-1	1-1
Hull v Stoke	1-1	1-2	0-2
Leicester v Crystal Palace	2-1	2-0	2-1
Swansea v Watford	2-1	2-0	1-1
West Ham v Sunderland	3-1	3-0	2-1
Liverpool v WBA	3-0	2-0	3-0
SUNDAY
Man.City v Southampton	2-1	3-1	2-0
Chelsea v Man.Utd.	2-1	0-0	1-1

Where Have All The Strikers Gone?

Missing in Action: The 20 Goals Per Season Striker.

Strikers After the encouraging victory on Saturday the emotional swingometer has turned completely on its axis shifting from doom and despair to euphoric optimism. While the positivity is welcome after such a disappointing start to the season a sense of perspective needs to be maintained as we come to the end of our run of ‘easier’ games. The formation and attitude worked well at Palace and now we need to see if that can be followed through at home to Sunderland.

I cannot yet jump on the new found enthusiasm for Simone Zaza bandwagon. I don’t see that after one hard working performance we have a solution to our long running striker dilemma. He may have ‘put in a shift’ but was he really ‘different class’? Slaven Bilic said that we wouldn’t have won without him and I can only go along with that if he meant the alternative was playing with 10 men. Now Slav’s comments may have been designed to give Zaza a boost but I would like to see a greater end product (i.e. goals) rather than good stats on aerial duels won before I become a believer.

Now this is not meant to be a Zaza bashing article but rather to consider why it is that we have failed to secure an even half prolific goal scorer for such a long period of time. If the 20 goals a season striker is elusive at most clubs then he has completely disappeared during West Ham’s Premier League tenure. A regular goalscorer has been a problem for many years. In our 20 Premier League seasons the best return that we have had was Di Canio’s 16 goals in 1999/2000. In only 7 of those 20 seasons has any West Ham player scored more than 10 league goals. In our last 10 Premier League seasons only Harewood (14 in 2005/6) and Zamora (11 in 2006/7) have exceeded the 10 goal mark. Quite a sorry return I would say. Sure it is great to get goals from all around the pitch but every successful team tends to have at least one consistent scorer.

Paolo is also our all time Premier League scorer with 47 goals in 118 appearances (an average of 2 goals every 5 games) followed by Carlton Cole with 41 goals in 216 appearances (1 in 5). Only 10 players in total have scored more than 20 Premier League goals for West Ham and these include penalty takers Mark Noble and Julian Dicks. Tony Cottee is the only player to have scored a Premier League goal for West Ham to appear in the list of our Top 10 all-time goalscorers; 23 of his 115 goals coming in the Premier League era.

In the modern game a striker needs to contribute more than just goals but a striker who doesn’t score is not really doing his job. It seems strange that we have not been able to unearth and keep a decent goalscorer in recent history. There have been those that didn’t stick around for long for various reasons (Defoe, Tevez, Bellamy, even Ba) plus the unfortunate Dean Ashton but otherwise there has just been a procession of misfiring lumps; often the result of emergency January transfer window loan deals.

A top striker was stated as the priority in the most recent transfer window and the names of potential targets were appearing in the media almost daily. It is difficult to know how many of these were genuine or realistic but the many players mentioned didn’t fit a profile for a particular style or type of player. In the end it seemed that most were either not interested or not available and we ended up in a last minute panic taking whatever was convenient. It reminded me a little of going shoe shopping with a woman who has nothing to match the dress she will be wearing that evening.

I would be quite happy for Zaza to prove me wrong but neither his goal scoring record nor his performances have raised expectations that he will suddenly start firing them in from all angles . As things stand I don’t see any short term end to our striker famine unless we are able to pin all our hopes on Toni Martinez.

Five Things From The Weekend

Some take-aways from West Ham’s win at Crystal Palace on Saturday.

A Much Improved All-Round Performance

Finally a performance to be proud of on Saturday. Played at a much higher tempo with good movement and penetrative passing. Playing three at the back worked very well and it also uncluttered the midfield of the Kouyate-Noble partnership allowing the ball to move much more freely and with real purpose. The returning Cresswell meant there were options on both flanks and his understanding and interplay with Payet can be devastating at times. Excellent performances (in no particular order) from Cresswell, Reid, Obiang, Kouyate and Lanzini. On the other hand, Noble still looks a little lost and well off the pace and must be coming under pressure from Fernandes who from his various cameo appearances looks assured and full of energy.

A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever

The Manuel Lanzini goal was a rare thing of beauty. This is the type of goal I love to see. I know they all count the same but, as far as goals to admire go ,the beautifully worked team goal trumps the 25 yard torpedo every time in my opinion. A flick by Payet, the wonderful pass from Obiang to Cresswell, the patient exchange between Cresswell and Payet, the teasing Cresswell cross and Lanzini’s perfect run and clinical finish. I have yet to tire of watching it. Elsewhere at the weekend I also came across fine well worked team goals by ex-Hammer Junior Stanislas for Bournemouth in their annihilation of Hull City and from last season loan reject Victor Moses netting the third for Chelsea against Leicester. The type of action that makes the game great to watch.

The Consistency of Inconsistent Refreeing

I have to admit that I have lost the plot as to what does and doesn’t constitute a penalty these days. If there is a foul tackle then it should be a foul regardless of how anyone reacts. Whether a player goes down (too) easily or not is besides the point. Clive Allen, the pundit on the commentary I had, thought Cresswell had ‘gone down too easily’ although it didn’t look theatrically in any way to me or, in fact, most other observers. The mistake was compounded by a booking for simulation and then exacerbated a minute later by the second yellow card from a marginal tussle with Zaha.

I wrote before the game that Atkinson had yet to issue a red card this season so maybe he was behind on his targets. There really is no consistency. In the Middlesbrough – Watford match referee Roger East yellow carded Boro’s Barragan for a foul (not too dissimilar to the Creeswell one) on Isaac Success but then when the defender committed almost a carbon copy on the same player a little later it went unpunished.

Sometimes decisions can be seen as harsh but Cresswell’s dismissal was simply wrong and it’s a travesty that the decision cannot be corrected and a suspension must be served.

– Graham Poll writing in the Daily Mail

Knowing Me, Knowing You, Zaza!

I would agree that Zaza probably had his best game in a West Ham shirt although to be honest the bar was set fairly low. Possibly he has worked on his fitness and he is getting closer to the levels required to operate in the Premier League. However, with the appearances clock ticking on the apparent ‘obligation to buy’ clause he still looks a long, long way away from being a £20 million striker (even at devalued prices). An off form striker is one getting into positions but being unable to finish whereas I can’t recall a serious Zaza goal attempt yet this season. I have heard people talking about him playing upfront with Carroll which seems laughable to me not only for the combined lack of mobility but also for the way it would by necessity weaken the midfield. If you are going to play with a lone striker I believe you need someone who is fast, brave, mobile and strong. It is puzzling how Bilic sees this as his striker targets don’t seem to follow any template. I was concerned by his comments that he had been interested in Benteke who is just another one dimensional player. As well as we defended on Saturday, Palace with Benteke were very predictable (as Pardew sides often are) and I hope that we can eventually find a striker to support a more fluid style of play; the type of job that Callum Wilson performed for Bournemouth in their game.

Loanee Watch

The purpose of sending young players out on loan is to aid their development by giving them game time and experience playing in the lower divisons. So, how are our loanees shaping up. Fresh from his first international goal for Norway, Martin Samuelsen was given a rare start for Blackburn but lasted for just over the hour in their goalless draw against Ipswich; Stephen Hendrie did not make the squad. Reece Burke (and I believe Kyle Knoyle) are both injured and so missed Wigan’s draw with Burton Albion. Josh Cullen played a full 90 minutes but couldn’t prevent Bradford surrendering their unbeaten record at Oxford while Lewis Page lasted 24 minutes for Coventry in their defeat at Charlton before injury required him to be substituted; at least it was all square at the time. George Dobson was an unused substitute in Walsall’s home victory against Shrewsbury. Doneil Henry was a second half substitute for AC Horsens in the 1-1 Danish Super League draw with AGF. Verdict: nothing to get excited about.

This Week in Hammer’s History

Shaking down the week 17-23 October in West Ham history.

This Week Hammers History In the new spirit of optimism that has swept into West Ham since the victory at Palace on Saturday I have decided to ignore any defeats in this week’s review of the week in Hammer’s history. The latest win completed a hat-trick of away victories at Selhurst Park and came almost a year after the previous success where goals from Jenkinson, Payet and Lanzini saw West Ham climb to 4th in the table.

Saturday also brought a welcome clean sheet courtesy of solid defending, some fine Adrian saves and Christian Benteke. The passing years have witnessed several high scoring, clean sheet performances which includes two thrashings of our next opponents, Sunderland. Most know of the 8 goal rout in 1968, famous for Geoff Hurst’s six-goal haul, but there was also a 5-0 victory in a second division clash in 1989 (two from Eamon Dolan). Ironically, Sunderland were promoted through the Play-offs that season despite losing the final when their victors, Swindon Town, were denied promotion due to irregular payments to players. West Ham meanwhile had finished in 7th place.

Other notable wins were a 4-0 European Cup Winner’s Cup second round tie against Poli Timisoara in 1980 and a 3-0 win in a bad tempered affair against Bolton Wanderers in 1997.

Dipping into the 1985/86 season it was during October that the season really started to pick up steam. We went into the month in 13th position with 13 points from 10 games (which is what winning our next two games would give us) and by the end had climbed to 7th following three wins and a draw.

On 19 October 1985 West Ham entertained Aston Villa in front of just 15,034 spectators at the Boleyn Ground. With no football on TV in the early part of the season I am relying on memory and I believe that we went 1-0 down to a Simon Stainrod goal before a brace each from McAvennie and Cottee secured a 4-1 victory. The two prolific front-men had by then scored 19 or the Hammer’s 23 league goals between them and went on to contribute 46 by the end of the campaign.

During the season a total of 9 players went on to start in 38 or more of the 42 league games played. One of these, Alan Dickens, was missing from the lineup against Villa: Parkes, Stewart, Walford, Gale, Martin, Devonshire, Ward, McAvennie, Parris, Cottee, Orr

One game to mention from this week that West Ham didn’t win was the 2-2 draw against Tottenham in 1970; a game that will always hold the record for the highest (official) attendance at the Boleyn Ground of 42,322. (As a teenager back then we would often go two people through the same turnstile click so I was always a little sceptical of the official attendances.)

The 1970 season was not one of the most memorable as we finished one place off of relegation. The match saw the debut of Tommy Taylor who I remembered as playing some nice football while being a little suspect defensively. Hurst and Eustace scored the West Ham goals: Grotier, Bonds, Lampard, Eustace, Taylor, Moore, Ayris, Lindsay, Hurst, Greaves, Dear

Birthdays this week:

18 October Peter Grotier (66)
21 October Paul Ince (49)
23 October Christian Dailly (43)

Matchday: Palace v West Ham

Can West Ham pull an unlikely iron out of the fire at Selhurst Park?

Palace West Ham Today the stuttering Hammers make the short trip across the river to take on Crystal Palace at the boisterous Selhurst Park. Somewhere in there is an interesting comparison between our perceptions of the Boleyn and London Stadium experience and the type of atmosphere that is currently created by Palace’s self-styled Holmedale Ultras. It has often been dismissed as ‘Happy Clappy’ but has certainly contributed to the team’s performance and helped them preserve top flight status longer than their usual tenure.

I have always pigeonholed Palace with their South London neighbours, Charlton and Millwall, as a lower league club who only occasionally visit the top table before returning to their natural level. However, their current leadership appear to be doing a reasonable job of bringing the yo-yo under control having secured more stable investment.

“I have to make a decision on Zaza over Saturday, that is the only decision I am thinking about: the game against Palace. The only thing I am thinking about Saturday is not about the situation in his contract or around his contract but is he going to be the one I will put at centre-forward? The only objective is can he do it against Palace?”

– Bilic on Zaza

Traditionally Palace were one of the other claret and blue sides and, like us, can trace this back to an association with Aston Villa; although theirs was a more formal relationship rather than being the recipient of some kit that fell of the back of a cart. It was former Hammer, Malcolm Allison, who prompted the change to the current red and blue strip.

My last visit to Selhurst Park was in January 1984 for an FA Cup 4th round tie. This ended 1-1 but all I can remember from the trip into the badlands is that it was the same day that Michael Jackson’s hair caught fire while filming a Pepsi commercial.

Head to Head

Historically we have done well against Palace although more recent encounters have been more even. We have won on the last two visits to Selhurst Park although the odds will not be be good on an unlikely hat-trick.

	P	W	D	L	F	A	Sequence
Home	15	6	8	1	22	13	DLLDWW
Away	16	6	7	3	29	18	WWLDLD
Neutral	1	0	0	1	0	1
	32	12	15	5	51	32

Team News

There have been several stories in the week about West Ham having received double or treble injury boosts. Unfortunately, the only good news is that Aaron Cresswell is available for selection; the others returning from injury being Nordtveit and Calleri who would be better to advised to go shopping on a Saturday afternoon. The only other positive injury news is that Gokhan Tore is unavailable. With no imminent return of long term absentees Carroll, Sakho or Ayew we still have no useful striker to call on and so our best bet for a goal will continue to be from a Payet free kick; so expect a lot of falling over outside the box.

The return of Cresswell is very welcome and his absence has been significant; not so much for his defending but in providing variety and penetration in attacking areas. It will be interesting to see if he gets a start or is only on the bench. Convention is that returning players no longer go straight into the starting XI but this seems a waste to me. If fit enough then make him a starter and replace if and when tiring.

‘But he’s an experienced manager – an experienced international manager – and he’ll know how to deal with it. Better than I will. I have no doubt he’ll get it right sooner rather than later.’

– Pardew on Bilic

Palace are likely to have former Hammer James Tomkins in their lineup together with plenty of other tall men with beards. Hint: they score a lot of goals from set pieces. Hopefully, we will have Obiang starting in midfield and that we compete much better in the central midfield areas (and don’t pair Kouyate and Noble together again). I would leave Noble out on this occasion and go with Kouyate simply because of his height. Up front I see no benefit of enduring with Zaza and how can Ashley Fletcher possibly do any worse. So my team is:

Adrian
Arbeloa Reid Ogbonna Cresswell
Antonio Lanzini Kouyate Obiang Payet
Fletcher

The Man in the Middle

Today’s referee is Martin Atkinson from West Yorkshire. This is his second West Ham games this season having previously officiated at the home game against Watford. He has yet to issue a red card this season – may be worth a bet?

Ponchos For Goalposts: Part deux!

There’ll always be an England (as long as we can find eleven players).

England Team A few weeks back I used the tedium of the international break to take a look at the composition of the squads in the Premier League in relation to nationality. Overall it showed that only 35% of Premier League players were English although this increased to 40% if you included the other home nations. I wondered at the time whether if you looked at those actually making it onto the pitch the situation would be even worse and so have used this recent break to undertake further research in the context of the continued underwhelming performance of the England national team.

England appear to be in a Groundhog Day cycle where they generally qualify with some ease (usually from a group where even a mid-table Championship would hope to do well) and then disappoint when it comes to the finals. We then replace the manager and start the cycle again. In truth this has been going on for almost 50 years (well before the Premier League and the foreign invasion) but it does remain a conundrum whereby England has the most famous and cosmopolitan league in the world but a extremely ordinary and uninspiring national team. Are the two related in anyway?

So far this season we have had seven rounds of Premier League matches; a total of 70 games in total which have featured 414 different players of which 342 have started at least one game. Bournemouth and Burnley have been the most frugal with fewest different starters (14) while Sunderland have had the most different starters (22). Chelsea have used fewest players if you included substitute players (18) while Sunderland have been the most lavish with 25. (It is an interesting contrast with Aston Villa winning the First Division in 1981 using only 14 players all season; how the game has changed.)

Of those starting and featuring (i.e. including substitute appearances) in a Premier League the proportion that are eligible to represent England is 34% and 33% respectively; this is consistent with the overall squad make-ups and so my assumption that it would be lower was not correct.

Bournemouth are the most English team with 72% of starters while Watford have had the least at 9% (just Troy Deeney). Only 3 clubs achieved over 50% of English starters (Bournemouth, Burnley and Palace) while Watford, Arsenal and Chelsea were all below 15%. The equivalent figure for West Ham is 25%. Collectively, the ‘so-called’ Big 4 (two Manchester Clubs, Chelsea and Arsenal) managed to scrape together 18% of Englishmen.

The average Premier League side then has less than 4 players eligible to represent England in any given lineup. In total that is somewhere over 70 playing Premier League football on a regular basis (allowing for injuries) giving them a 1 in 3 chance of being selected for an England squad. To my knowledge, Joe Hart is the only English player of note performing overseas.

The big ‘chicken and egg’ question that this raises is: Does the lack of quality English players lead to the recruitment of so many overseas players or does the number of foreign players restrict the development of good young home grown talent? Whatever way it is difficult not to conclude that the the declining number of English players in the Premier League must have had an adverse effect on the national side. How to fix this without impacting the ‘brand’?

Far be it from me to defend the largely clueless England manager’s that we have seen over the years but there has not really been the depth of talent for them to work with. All the more reason, in my opinion, to find someone (like Sir Alf) who has a system and will then find the players to fit it; rather than the other way around.

No wonder my interest in the England team is going down quicker than sterling (the currency not the Man City player that is)!

The Boy Never Quite Made It: Ray Houghton

The One That Got Away Series.

Boy Never Quite Made It OK, so to suggest that someone who won 2 League Championships, 2 FA Cups, 2 League Cups, played in 2 World Cups and a Euro Finals ‘didn’t quite make it‘ may be something of a stretch. In the context of this series though Ray Houghton is another West Ham academy graduate who, for some reason, never became an established first-team player at the club.

Houghton was not a young player who had just trained with us for a while before being enticed away by another club (John Terry) or a youngster sold as part of a relegation fire sale (Glen Johnson) but was a 20 year old professional who was considered surplus to requirements and made available on a free transfer. Tony Carr has been reported as saying that allowing Houghton to leave on a free “was the biggest transfer blunder he had seen during his years at Upton Park.”

Houghton was born in Glasgow but moved with his family to London as a 10 year old. He joined West Ham’s youth set up and during that time was called up to attend Under 18 training camps by Scotland youth supremo (and future manager) Andy Roxburgh but without being awarded any caps.

In May 1982 Houghton made his one and only appearance for West Ham when he came on as a substitute for George Cowie in an away fixture with Arsenal that West Ham lost 2-0. Cowie was another young Scot who did not make a mark at West Ham and the lineup that day also included another youngster Everard La Ronde who also had a short lived West Ham career. End of season games were often used back then as an opportunity to blood a few young players.

As an aside, West Ham had won the FA Youth Cup in 1981 beating Tottenham over two legs with a 2-1 aggregate score. The West Ham squad for the games of Vaughan, Keith, La Ronde, Reader, Ampofo, McPherson, (Bobby) Barnes, (Paul) Allen, Milton, Burvill, Schiavi, (Alan) Dickens had no place for Houghton who would have been eligible.

Ray Houghton Houghton was allowed to leave in the summer of 1982 and joined Fulham, then in Division 2, on a free transfer. There is not much written about the circumstances of his leaving and so it is difficult to tell if he was simply a late developer, whether his rejection spurred him on to what he subsequently achieved or whether his style just didn’t suit West Ham . Whatever the case manager John Lyall and the coaching staff did not see any potential that merited a further contract.

Houghton was an instant hit at Craven Cottage and his new manager Malcolm MacDonald allegedly asked Lyall “Do you have any other free transfers like that?” His energetic and all-action style of play was soon noticed and earned him a transfer to First Division Oxford United (where he scored in their 1986 League Cup final win) and then to Liverpool where he is spent the most productive years of his career.

As well as rejection at West Ham, Houghton did not receive a call to represent Scotland, the country of his birth, and eventually agreed to play for Jack Charlton’s Republic of Ireland side.. He earned 73 international caps and is remembered for winning goals against England in the 1988 Euros and against Italy in the 1994 World Cup.

Obviously it is pure conjecture but I wonder what impact Houghton could have made at West Ham from the mid 1980’s onwards as they looked to build on the 1985/86 success?

Let’s Talk About Money

The conundrum of stadium, money, tradition and success.

Money Do you ever stop to consider why you support a football club? What is it that makes you want to invest so much time, money and emotion into the fortunes of a particular team? What do you get or want out of it in return?

Of course there is no simple answer as everyone has their own story and perspective. Originally it would have been about creating bonds and a sense of community; families, friends, territories and rivalries. Perhaps this still exists in the lower leagues at places such as Rochdale or Hartlepool (who I understand to be the most unsuccessful teams in history) but it has become less relevant at the top level; particularly in the Premier League where money and success rule. The dilemma for a team such as West Ham (or more importantly its supporters) is what constitutes success and what are you prepared to sacrifice to secure it?

It is no surprise to anyone that there is a strong correlation between how much money is available to a club and the level of success on the pitch; if we measure success by league position or trophies won. The move to the London Stadium was, no doubt, seen by the owners as an opportunity for the club to progress financially, to keep Tottenham off our patch and to increase the value of their investment. I don’t want to get involved in the merits or otherwise of the new stadium and we have to accept that there is no going back; like it or not we should concentrate on making the most of what we now have. We are now in the London Stadium; where can it take us?

“The clubs who have better financial resources have the better teams”

– A Wenger

Based on the financial accounts for 2014/15 West Ham were the 20th biggest club in Europe (in terms of revenue) and the 9th biggest in the UK. We were one of a cluster of English clubs with reasonably similar levels of revenue comprising Newcastle, Everton, West Ham, Aston Villa and Southampton. Manchester United are way ahead of everyone else followed by a closely grouped Manchester City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool. There is then a gap to Tottenham before a further gap to our own group.

As Tottenham is the nearest financial target in our sights if we are to improve our relative position then I use them for comparison purposes only. In 2014/15 Tottenham had revenues of £196m compared to West Ham’s £122m. With a similar sized stadium they were able to generate more than us in Matchday (£41m/ £20m), TV (£95m/ £79m) and Commercial (£59m/ £24m) revenues. TV contributed 65% of West Ham’s revenue compared to Tottenham’s 49%.

The larger stadium will certainly generate incremental Matchday cash but it is difficult to see the direct impact that it will have on TV or Commercial activity; as these are more a function of team success and wider, higher profile. For the sponsors involved with football the attraction of Premier League clubs is the worldwide appeal of the major teams participating and this an area where both West Ham and Tottenham suffer in comparison with the (so-called) big 5 clubs. (In fact I ave not seen any significant major overseas profile for Manchester City yet but they can at least rely on the UAE for hefty sponsorship deals). Tottenham fare better than us with commercial sponsorship due to their longer and more regular involvement in European competition but they are still some way behind the others. It would be rare in Asia, for instance, to see locals wearing Tottenham or West Ham shirts and that is why our sponsors have tended to be local rather than international businesses. Breaking into that club and attracting overseas support is a major challenge for any new team.

So where does that leave us? Potentially with improved financial security and topping the also-rans-financial league I mentioned above, but with a mountain to climb if we want to see a sustainable step change in status. Over the last 4 years West Ham have been the 5th largest net transfer spenders (notable for our lack of large transfers out) and although this has brought relative improvement we remain firmly part of that mid-table pack. A realistic view is that it would appear virtually impossible to grow organically into a truly big club; only significant external investment can make that difference. Otherwise the future is the same mid-ranking club but in a much larger stadium.

And that brings us back to the original questions. What does success look like and how badly do we want it? Surely it should be better than 4 cups in 50 years but are we prepared to give up the remaining sense of community, tradition and what it means to be a Hammer in order to achieve it?

Source: Financial information taken from the excellent Swiss Ramble blog.

This Week in Hammer’s History

Picking through the scraps of the week 10 – 16 October in West Ham history.

This Week Hammers History Continuing from last week’s theme there was an unprecedented run of League Cup successes during this week in history with victories, sometimes convincing ones, over Stoke, Sunderland, Mansfield, Bournemouth and Villa (twice). It seems that if we avoid the first round ‘banana skin’ then we are on a roll in this competition; so set your expectations for the impending Chelsea clash in a few week’s time. The one League Cup defeat though was a poor one in the shape of a 1962 away defeat by 3 goals to 1 against Rotherham.

Looking through the results I am generally attracted by the high scoring games and there have been a number of these which we will look at in a little more detail.

At the start of the 1986/87 season expectations were high following the record third place place finish last time out. The season started encouragingly, stuttered a little with successive home defeats to Forest and Liverpool but then picked up again to put us on the fringes of the top 6. On 11 October 1986 Chelsea were the visitors at Upton Park; a side that represented the highs and lows from the 85/86 season including their final day defeat to Liverpool. With Devonshire and Martin absent, the Hammers had Paul Hilton in defence, a young Kevin Keen in the midfield and Billy Bonds back on the bench. It was a game of 3 penalties (including 2 that were quite debatable) and it was one of these that gave Chelsea a 1-0 lead. However, a McAvennie header and a Tonka Stewart special penalty put the home side back in front at half time. In the second half Chelsea grabbed two more goals to reclaim the lead before another Stewart penalty and two from Cottee earned a thrilling 5-3 victory.

Parkes, Stewart, Parris, Gale, Hilton, Keen, Ward, McAvennie (Bonds), Dickens, Cottee, Orr

By 1992 were sitting out the inaugural season of the Premier League following relegation from the First Division to the First Division. After a sluggish start we had started to build some momentum when we met Sunderland at home on 11 October. The game was something of a romp as goals from Keen, Morley, Martin Allen, Martin and Mark Robson (2) gave the watching 10,326 supporters an afternoon to remember with an imperious 6-0 victory. The win put West Ham back in the top 6 where they stayed for the rest of the season. By the middle of January we commenced a long run in second spot behind Newcastle until surrendering it to Portsmouth during the run-in only to nick it back at the death and secure automatic promotion on the final day of the season.

Miklosko, Breacker, Dicks, Potts, Martin, M Allen, Robson, Butler, Morely, C Allen, Keen

On 14 October 2001 new manager Glen Roeder took his floundering side to Ewood Park to take on Blackburn Rovers. In the previous match West Ham had conceded 5 without reply at Everton and so started the game looking to keep things tight at the back. The tactic worked for 18 minutes until 3 goals in 10 minutes ruined Roeder’s game plan although Michael Carrick managed to pull one back before half time. The introduction of Hayden Foxe and Grant McCann at the break gave the Hammers some added impetus and might easily have reduced the deficit further (including one shocking miss by Trevor Sinclair) until Tomas Repka was sent off (his second dismissal in 3 games) after picking up a second yellow card. Four more Blackburn goals ensued (including a Grant McCann own goal) to make it 7-1 and a humiliating afternoon for the Hammers; leaving them second from bottom in the Premier League. Despite this a post Christmas surge saw West Ham finish in a respectable 7th place.

Hislop, Schemmel, Soma, Dailly (Foxe), Repka, Hutchison, Sinclair, Carrick, Kanoute, Di Canio, Moncur (McCann)

For anyone into self-flagellation there are extended highlights of this match below:

Notable West Ham birthdays this week:

10 October Mark Ward 54
12 October Paul Goddard 57
13 October Scott Parker 36