Author: Richard Bennett

Wonders will never cease. We kick off at 3pm on a Saturday. How many times does that happen in a season? I haven’t checked the numbers but it seems to me that it happens fewer times as each season goes by. Perhaps today was always destined to be a 3pm Saturday kick off as in many ways (if you disregard the dubious honour of the chase for seventh place in the Premier League) this was always going to be a game that didn’t involve the top or bottom. Of course seventh place could mean a place in Europe in the Europa League, but as Arsenal and Chelsea have found out this season after progressing to the semi-finals of this competition, it means even fewer Saturday 3pm starts.

It wouldn’t have taken much more for us still to be in contention for a seventh place finish this season, and I suppose mathematically it is still possible. But Leicester, Wolves, Watford, Everton and ourselves have all demonstrated an inconsistency of performance that shows why we are all so far behind the elite six at the top of the table. I thought that Everton looked destined for the honour after their recent run. They looked as good in our last home game as we were woeful. But then last week they went down to Fulham who haven’t won a game for ages.

Leicester currently hold the position, but the four teams realistically likely to finish seventh are only separated by one point, and both Watford and Wolves have a game in hand. But with all the teams faltering to some extent, any team that can put together a winning run could get there, even ourselves, although this doesn’t seem likely.

Of course it would have seemed more likely if VAR had been in operation at Old Trafford last weekend. Once again we witnessed a “bigger” team getting the benefit of close calls. It never seems to happen the other way round, especially at grounds like Old Trafford where officials seem to me to give disproportionate numbers of close decisions to the home team. I haven’t looked at the statistics but I reckon Manchester United have been awarded more spot kicks than most this season. We totally outplayed United in my opinion, and deserved all three points but thanks mainly to the officials it wasn’t to be.

VAR came into its own in midweek when I believe it helped to get the decisions correct in a big game in another part of Manchester. As a long term advocate of the use of video replays I was pleased to see it used to good effect. Of course, many West Ham (and Arsenal) fans would have preferred it not to be the case when Sterling’s “winner” in time added on turned out not to be a legitimate goal because Aguero was offside in the build-up. But leaving loyalties aside, I for one am pleased that VAR is beginning to prove itself, and look forward to it next season. It could be improved if, as in rugby union, the referees were “miked up” to explain what was happening.

So, on to today. It seems that Nasri is once again unavailable due to injury, and Lanzini likewise, making a dent in the creative capability in our midfield. But apparently Wilshere is fit again so perhaps he will come in and start to show why we bought him. Hernandez is also unavailable because he couldn’t train this week with a problem with his ear.

I had given up predicting the team our manager would select but I’ll have another go this week.

Fabianski, Fredericks, Balbuena, Ogbonna, Masuaku, Rice, Noble, Snodgrass, Antonio, Arnautavic, Anderson. How many will I get right this time?

With thanks to the Daily Telegraph I see that there hasn’t been a draw in the Premier League for about a month (34 matches). And 0-0 games are at their lowest level with just one in twenty games ending goalless. It seems that teams aren’t happy to “settle for a point” these days. What will happen in the match today? Our last but one game was a 4-3 thriller, and of course there was a similar scoreline in midweek in Manchester. Perhaps another one today? The odds on that are around 80/1, with a West Ham win at about 2/1, and a West Ham win with both teams to score around 4/1.

Once again we kick-off at a non-standard time – this one is 5.30pm on a Saturday afternoon. We get the chance to watch two teams whose recent form leaves a lot to be desired. At this stage of the season you need to have some form of motivation to perform at your best, and I’m afraid we are somewhat lacking at the moment. OK, the performance against Chelsea was better than what we witnessed against Everton a couple of weeks ago, but to be quite frank, after the raised hopes of our winning streak in December, 2019 has turned out to be rather flat.

The difference today is that Manchester United still have a target to aim for, namely a place in the top four and the Champions League qualification that comes with it, whereas we don’t really have much to get us going other than professional pride, and trying to finish in the top half of the table. Our manager wants us to improve with every game and believes that “we still have a mathematical chance for Europe and we must try for that.” Who is he kidding? Mathematical, yes, but realistically no chance whatsoever.

If we win today (and that’s a massive if, around 7/1 with bookmakers but surely the odds should be much greater than that!) it would be the first time that we’ve picked up six points in a season against the Red Devils since 2006-07, when they were champions, and we completed the “Great Escape” on the final day of the season. We won both games that season by 1-0, with Nigel Reo-Coker scoring in the home win a week or so before Christmas, and of course Carlos Tevez netting the winner in the last game. That was a season to remember; Tevez and Mascherano, Eggert Magnusson, Pardew sacked, Curbishley appointed, seven of the last nine games won after just five wins in the preceding 29 games, and of course the subsequent financial repercussions of the escape.

But today we don’t have a lot to play for. Our record against United is actually better than against many of the other big clubs, and the last eight league meetings are split with two wins apiece and four draws. However our last league win there was the aforementioned victory on the last day of the season almost 12 years ago.

Despite their impressive form when their new Norwegian manager was appointed on a caretaker basis, recent results have not been good for United, and they have not kept a clean sheet for eight games, their longest run for seven years. They have also lost four of their last five games.

But just look at our away form since 30 December 2018. There was the abysmal defeat to AFC Wimbledon, and in the league on our travels we lost 2-0 to Burnley, 2-0 at Bournemouth, 3-0 at Wolves, 1-0 at Manchester City, 2-0 at Cardiff, and 2-0 at Chelsea. That is six games lost with 12 goals conceded and none scored. In between we did manage a 1-1 draw at Crystal Palace, but had Fabianski to be thankful for that, as Palace had numerous shots on our goal in the second half.

Our record of keeping clean sheets is the second worst in the division with five, and only Fulham have kept fewer. Even Huddersfield have kept more clean sheets than we have. Fabianski is miles clear in the number of saves he has made this season compared to every other Premier League custodian, so this tells us everything we need to know about our defending.

And to top all this we are facing Romelu Lukaku who scores goals against us for fun. I’ll be watching and hoping for a surprise of course, but it is hard to see anything other than a defeat as our season limps towards its conclusion.

A couple of weeks ago I renewed my season ticket for next season. 2019-20 will my 62^nd season of following West Ham. How many hundreds of games have I seen in that time? Why do I do it? Am I a masochist? I knew a masochist once who liked to take cold showers. So he took hot ones. But seriously why do I spend half a day or more so many times each year travelling to watch 90 minutes of football? What’s more there are 60,000 others who do the same to watch West Ham, as well as countless others throughout the country, and indeed the world, that want to know what happens to the team in every game. And this is replicated to a greater or lesser extent by followers of 19 other teams in the Premier League, as well as millions who follow teams throughout the pyramid of the English game. I guess we love to watch football, but more than that we want to see our team win games and be successful.

Of course, the best I’ve seen from the team in the last 61 years has been a third place finish in the top flight in 1985-86, three FA Cup wins, a major European trophy, and countless great games of football with lots of entertainment and great goals. I’ve also seen a lot of dross. In many ways, one of the most enjoyable seasons was in 1980-81 when, a year after lifting the FA Cup as a second division side, we ran away with the second division league title with a record points haul and a home record to die for, winning 19 of our 21 league games at Upton Park. After losing our first home game that season to Luton, we won every other game apart from a home draw against Oldham. We all came away happy after every game. Other seasons outside of the top flight have given us some great entertainment, with more games won than lost, and probably a much better feel good factor about our team.

Yet all teams want to dine at the top table. They all strive to be part of the Premier League, possibly the most successful domestic football league in the world. Of course money is a big factor, as well as the opportunity to see some of the top players playing for the top teams. Ironically the Premier League is one of the most competitive amongst the major leagues in Europe. I say competitive meaning that probably six teams have a chance of winning it each year. Compare this to Germany, France, Italy and Spain, where only one or two teams have any chance each season. Some might say that is true of the Premier League this time around where the second placed team (Manchester City) are currently 16 points clear of Tottenham who are third. Similarly there is a wide gulf between Manchester United in sixth who are 14 points ahead of the team who are seventh. Where is the fun in the fact that at the start of the season 14 of the 20 participants have zero chance of winning the league, and four of the others have only a very small chance? OK I remember Leicester, but that was a freak season and will not happen again.

I suppose I cannot really criticise the Premier League when the top six elite clubs are so successful in Europe this season. Four of them are in the last eight of the Champions League, and the other two are similarly placed in the Europa League. But this is entirely my point. The top six are too good. Wouldn’t we all like to see a competition that is more competitive which would lead to much greater excitement? Unless your team is still in the FA Cup, the final third of the season becomes very dull with little to play for. Of course there is money for placings in the league but that only seems to interest the club owners, not those actually in the team, who if West Ham’s players are anything to go by are already thinking of their summer holidays, rather than professional pride, and entertaining the thousands who come to watch them.

The performance against Everton last week lacked effort and desire, and was feeble, abysmal, appalling, very bad, awful, dire, ghastly, atrocious, hideous, dismal, terrible, maddening, disgraceful. Add any other description you like. We would have been seventh in the league if we had won the game, yet quite frankly, apart from Fabianski and Rice (perhaps Ogbonna?) none of the others turned up or seemed remotely interested. Even the manager, who I quite like, cannot escape criticism with his team selection, surely? Seventh would mean the best of the rest (outside the elite six). Surely that is something worth playing for? The owners must have been cringing in their expensive seats as they watched the team doing their level best to reduce the interest in season ticket renewals.

And while we were struggling against Everton, and fans were leaving in droves well before the end, Chelsea, our opponents today, were not faring much better against struggling Cardiff. The South Wales club outplayed their more illustrious opponents from West London, yet the result of the game was inevitable somehow as it always seems to be when a top six club plays against a lowly side. Chelsea won the game thanks to some incredible decisions by officials, including an offside as blatant as the one for Liverpool’s goal at the London Stadium a couple of months ago, both of which left you feeling that the top sides somehow always seem to benefit from questionable decisions. It never seems to be the other way around.

The result of the game highlights my point about the wide chasm between the teams at the top and those at the bottom. The record for the elite six teams playing against the bottom three sides this season so far reads, played 31, won 31, goals for 90, against 18. Watford, just a point away from seventh place, have now lost nine consecutive games against the top six sides. What chance will they have in the FA Cup Final? Wolves, however, the team most likely to finish seventh, are doing their best to disprove my theory with four wins and four draws (and just two defeats) against the top six, whilst even our own team performed creditably (at home at least) against Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool.

What will happen this evening? Another “bad day at the office” like the one we witnessed last week will see us beaten easily, even by a ‘relatively poor’ Chelsea side, who nonetheless are 21 points better off than we are, and still in the hunt for a Champions League place next season, helped by Arsenal’s loss at Goodison Park yesterday. In just over a week we have gone from a team who could have gone seventh in the league, to a team now in the bottom half, four points (and a poorer goal difference) adrift of the tenth placed side.

With nothing other than pride and place money to play for, even the most optimistic among us find it hard to envisage anything other than a defeat tonight. It would be great to see the players turn it on for our fans who make the trek across London, and those watching on TV, but the bookmakers’ odds showing Chelsea at 4/1 on, and West Ham 9/1 against to win the game are a pretty fair reflection of what is likely to happen. Chelsea have only lost one of their 16 home league games to date. At Stamford Bridge they have beaten Arsenal, Tottenham and Manchester City, and drawn with the other two elite teams, Manchester United and Liverpool this season, so what chance do we have of doubling their home defeats figure? Their only loss at home was against Leicester. I’d love us to do the same as the Foxes, but I won’t be holding my breath.

This week I went to see Only Fools and Horses – the Musical. As a fan of the TV programme I thought that this stage musical, originally the brainchild of the show’s creator sadly deceased, John Sullivan, was superb. There was an interval to the show, but only one. It is not a perfect analogy I know, but I don’t think the audience would have been happy with four breaks. But this is exactly what happens to the domestic football season when the natural rhythm of weekly matches is broken by international football matches.

Some may like this but I am not keen personally. It is certainly better when the matches have some meaning (as in qualification for the 2020 European Championships), and are not friendly matches with limitless substitutions. I guess this is especially so when the England team rattle in five goals in each of their two matches against arguably our strongest opponents in the qualifying group, and have virtually qualified already. I’d still like to see the international break limited to perhaps once in the season, and then have additional matches for the national teams at the end of the domestic season. When I was young England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland used to play the Home International Championship at this time and it worked well. Qualifying matches for major tournaments could be played at the season end without frequently interrupting the domestic leagues.

Today we face Everton, so we have two clubs still aiming for a seventh place finish, but despite their aspirations both will probably fall short. Apart from the opening few games in our case, neither team has been involved in the relegation scrap at the foot of the table. Both are comfortably placed in mid-table, but both probably believe they should be a bit higher, and want to challenge Wolves and Watford for the honour of finishing as the top team outside the elite six. Three points this afternoon would help the cause of both and keep the winning team in with an outside chance. In fact a West Ham win could even put us in seventh place after this weekend’s games if Watford and Wolves slip up in their away games at Manchester United and Burnley respectively.

It would be great to see a seven goal thriller for the second consecutive home game but this is highly unlikely. More likely (I hope) is a 3-1 home victory to match our win at Goodison Park earlier in the season, and the score in our win over the Toffeemen in the final home game last season. If I recall correctly our three goals in May were all from outside the box. Lanzini scored two of them in what was to be his last game for us until recently (of course we didn’t know that at the time!) and Arnie thumped one home from 20 yards too. To me it highlighted the limitations of Jordan Pickford as a goalkeeper, and commentators would have said that he would have been disappointed to let them in. Of course since then he has cemented his place in goal for the national team, although I remain unconvinced. Of all the England keepers currently playing who I have seen live my preference is for Jack Butland of Stoke. He is probably overlooked as he is not playing Premier League football though.

Just to emphasise the importance of the results when playing against teams around you in the league I will go back 50 seasons to 1968-69. That was an excellent time for us, and our final finishing position was eighth whilst Everton finished third. We began that season so well only losing one of our opening eleven league games. That defeat was our biggest of the season, a resounding 4-1 loss at “fortress” Upton Park to Everton. We also lost the return fixture at Goodison Park. Had we won both of those games then Everton would have finished fourth and we would have been sixth at the end. In the following season Everton were the champions of England, topping the league by a massive nine points (these were the days of only two points for a win). We finished seventeenth. And yes, they beat us twice that season too.

Our head to head record against Everton is a poor one, where our wins and the drawn games are just about equal to the number of Everton victories. For a long time in the early years of this century, Everton were considered to be a bogey team, and Lukaku seemed unable to fail to score when they played us. In fact, until our 3-1 win on the final day of last season, we had only beaten them twice at home in the league in the 21^st century, both 1-0 victories in 2002 and 2007. Although there was, of course, the FA Cup win 9-8 on penalties when Adrian famously threw his gloves to the ground before scoring the winning penalty.

One league where Everton and West Ham are fighting for top spot is that of most games lost in the Premier League. Both have topped the table in recent times, and there is little to choose between the two, although Everton have played considerably more games than we have, as they have been ever present. Everton currently lead by 374 to 371. But to be fair, it is not all bad news as to have this record confirms longevity and appearances in the Premier League, with both clubs also in the top ten for games won too.

The similarity of inconsistency and records this season is reflected in the bookmakers’ odds, where we are slight favourites at 6/4 to win the game. Everton are 7/4 with the draw at 9/4. 1-1 is the favourite score at around 5/1, whereas a West Ham win of 1-0 is 8/1, and a repeat of the 3-1 for our last two wins over Everton in the past year is 18/1. Our home record is improving, whereas Everton have been relatively poor on their travels. But the past counts for nothing. I’ll go for 3-1 again, although any victory would keep us in the hunt for a seventh placed finish.

In the football season, when you arrive at the middle of March you hope that the team that you support has something to play for. It is not as interesting when you are just going through the motions looking ahead to next season, without any real aims, such as a place in Europe, a visit to Wembley for the FA Cup Final, or even in a poor season, a fight against relegation. A place in Europe is still a possibility, albeit a receding one, following our non-show in Wales last week. Although we sit in ninth place, seventh place is still achievable with a good run-in in the final eight games, as we are just five points behind Wolves, and four behind Watford, our two main rivals for the coveted seventh place, also known as “the best of the rest”, or Premier League Division 2 champions, once the “elite six” are disregarded. But how much easier would seventh position and a place in Europe have been if we had picked up three points at Cardiff last week. But once again we showed that we are the most consistently inconsistent team.

Of course if we had taken the FA Cup more seriously, and not lost to a pub team destined for relegation to an even lower division than the lowly one they currently reside in, then the interest of us fans would be still heightened as we looked forward to the latter stages of the competition, and possibly quarter-final ties this weekend. But once again it was not to be. I believe that we have been eliminated from the two domestic cup competitions by teams from a lower division more than any other team in my 60 years of following West Ham.

But despite all this, I have already renewed my season ticket for next season, and look forward to my visit to the London Stadium today. Surely we must overcome relegation-bound Huddersfield, who sit at the foot of the Premier League with a meagre 14 points, which makes them 16 points from safety with eight games to go.

But if you want some reasons why we might not win, then here are 7 to be getting on with.  West Ham fans will understand what I mean.

We have never lost to Huddersfield in a Premier League game.

1. We haven’t lost a league game to Huddersfield since the weekend of my very first date with my wife, which was over 47 years ago!
2. We are unbeaten at home in 2019.
3. If we win it would be the first time that we have won three consecutive league games at the London Stadium.
4. Huddersfield have lost 7 of their last 8 games.
5. Huddersfield have only scored 8 goals on their travels – which is less than any other team in the Premier League.
6. Huddersfield have failed to score in 5 successive away games.

Ironically our overall record against Huddersfield in history is a negative won, but that is mainly due to the fact that they were once a force in the game. This is before most people who are alive today can remember. In their golden period back in the 1920s and 1930s they won the league title in three successive years, and were runners-up on three other occasions, also winning the FA Cup at that time, and were finalists in four other years. But latterly they have been in the doldrums relatively speaking, and after relegation in 1972 they spent the next 45 years in the three tiers outside the top flight until returning in 2017. After just about surviving last season they are now on their way back down.

Despite our inconsistency, even the bookmakers make us very strong odds-on favourites to win the game at odds of about 8/15. Given our visitors inability to score away from home then you would have to believe that a win to nil would be a good bet, and the odds will depend on how many it might be.

For example, 1-0 is favourite at 9/2, 2-0 is 11/2, 3-0 is 10/1, 4-0 is 22/1, 5-0 is 70/1, with 6-0 200/1. But remember this is West Ham we are talking about. Huddersfield might score and might beat us. I’d like to think that won’t happen though. Let’s hope that we can turn up, turn it on, and our attacking players in particular can provide us with some goals to cheer. I’m hoping for 3-0 or 4-0. Let’s see.

Wolves and Watford are still involved in the FA Cup this weekend, and both have away games to play in the league next. We have this game at home to Huddersfield and our next game is at home to Everton. That five point gap can be dramatically closed, or possibly eradicated completely by the end of March. If we can win these two games then we can definitely challenge for seventh place. Three points today is a must to enable this to happen.

December 2018 was a record month for the Hammers. Five wins in seven games including three at the start of the month against the Magpies, Bluebirds and Eagles. Those are the three flying creatures who we have done well against this season. Our record has not been as impressive however against the Seagulls or Hornets, neither of whom we have beaten. Today’s game gives us the opportunity to extend our run of consecutive wins against the team from the Welsh capital to eight. In fact our overall record against them is outstanding. Since December 1965 we have faced them on 22 occasions, winning 15, drawing 5, and losing just twice. Only one of those defeats came in our last 11 visits to play them in Cardiff.

2019 league results have a symmetrical feel to them with three wins, three draws and three defeats. Excellent performances to beat Arsenal and draw with Liverpool have been counter-balanced by defeats (and poor performances) at Bournemouth and Wolves. When I dusted down my crystal ball before a football had been kicked this season, I looked ahead to what I could see would be another predictable season in the top flight of English football. And as it turns out I haven’t been far wrong. My top six were Manchester City, Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea, Tottenham and Arsenal, and with just nine games remaining those half dozen clubs are 13 points clear of the sides chasing them. Not the hardest prediction to make I know, but nevertheless the group at the top show no signs of giving up their positions in the “elite six” in the Premier League. I may even have those six in the correct order by the season’s end, but if not, it won’t be far off.

I then guessed that the four teams who would be chasing them without any real hope of joining the group would be Wolves, Everton, Leicester and ourselves, and that too has turned out much as I expected as they occupy 7^th, 9^th, 10^th and 11^th.

Watford are the team that have surprised me, as they are currently 8th and level on points with Wolves for that coveted seventh place. In my predictions last August I felt that they would be one of the half dozen clubs in biggest danger of falling down into the Championship, the others being Bournemouth, Brighton, Fulham, Huddersfield and Cardiff. Not quite so accurate there, although the last three on that list are the clubs currently occupying the relegation places.

When the season began I am sure that Neil Warnock, the Cardiff manager, would have been more than delighted to still be in with a chance of avoiding the drop in March. At present they are just two points away from Southampton who are 17^th ( realistically 3 points away from the bottom three when their goal difference is taken into account), and will believe that they can still be a Premier League side next season, although it will be a difficult task.

Five of their seven wins this season have come at home to Fulham, Brighton, Wolves, Southampton and Bournemouth, with two victories on their travels at Leicester and Southampton. Their double over Southampton, who are their nearest rivals for the drop as it currently stands, has been vital in keeping them in with a chance. They have drawn four games this season against Newcastle, Palace, and Huddersfield (twice) without a goal being scored in any of them. So based on that statistic alone, if a goal is scored in today’s game, then one of the two sides will come out on top. Cardiff don’t do score draws.

As more of our first team squad return to full fitness, our manager is given a greater choice in who he selects for both the starting eleven and the match day squad of 18. I was very impressed with Balbuena this season (he appeared on the front cover of the home game against Cardiff in December) and felt that his partnership with Diop was the way forward. But, despite not being Ogbonna’s biggest fan, due to what I perceive to be a tendency to occasionally “switch off” at vital times, I have enjoyed his recent stand-out performances, and he will be hard to displace in the starting eleven. Fredericks is beginning to find his feet in the side, and together with Cresswell (if fit) will surely occupy the full back berths. Surely not even the most ardent Adrian fans (and there are many) can argue against the choice of Fabianski as the number one custodian; he has exceeded most expectations with many faultless performances.

Rice and Noble will surely occupy the two “defensive” midfield slots, and of course they were our two goalscorers last week in the victory over Newcastle. That leaves four offensive positions to be filled. Surely Anderson and Lanzini will occupy two of them leaving the remaining places to be taken by Antonio (or perhaps Snodgrass), and then Hernandez (or Arnautavic). My preference would be for Antonio and Arnautavic, although Snodgrass has done little wrong. Hernandez has improved his play outside the box as the season has progressed, but I still remain unconvinced with his “fox in the box” reputation, and don’t believe he converts as many chances as I thought he would when we signed him. Of course Arnautavic remains a bit of an enigma (and always will be I suspect), but at his best he is a formidable striker who adds quite a goalscoring threat to our team.

Unusually for West Ham playing away from home we are favourites with the bookmakers to win the game at around 6/5, with the odds around 16/1 for us to repeat the scoreline in the reverse fixture on that cold early December Tuesday evening when we ran out 3-1 winners with two goals from Perez and one from Antonio. If we are serious in believing that we are a “big team” and that we can be the seventh best team in the Premier League, than these are the games that we must win just as the “big teams” do.

Three of the games that we have lost this season have been to Wolves (twice) and to Watford, our two main challengers for the seventh spot. Had we won those games then we would now be sitting on 48 points, 8 clear of Watford (whose tally would be 40, and 11 clear of Wolves who would be on 37). We have also lost twice to Bournemouth. Six more points and we could have been sitting pretty on 54 points only just outside of the top six. These are the games that we must do better in next season if we are going to push on and get nearer to those clubs at the top. But in addition to the matches against our closest rivals we must beat the teams who are struggling in the bottom half as well. A win in the Welsh capital today would help enormously in our attempt to reach seventh place.

The game after this one is at home to Huddersfield. Wolves have two away fixtures against Chelsea and Burnley coming up, whilst Watford face both Manchester clubs in their next two games. If results go our way we could be in seventh place with seven games of the season to go. That would be quite an achievement considering the lead we gave those two clubs after four games of the season, especially Watford who we trailed by 12 points at that time. But whatever the results elsewhere we must keep on winning, and I’m looking for a repeat of the 3-1 win that we achieved in December.

49 years ago next month, one of the most prolific goalscorers in English football made his debut for West Ham. A certain Jimmy Greaves, aged only 30 at the time, but nearing the end of his career was acquired from Tottenham as part exchange in Martin Peters transfer to White Hart Lane. Greaves England career had ended in 1967 with 44 goals in only 57 international appearances, a phenomenal strike rate at that level, and it was hoped that his arrival would spark a revival in Hammers’ fortunes, as we were languishing in 17^th place in the table with half a dozen games to go.

His first game in March 1970 was at Maine Road, then the home of Manchester City, at the time a mid-table team, although two seasons previously they had been league champions. The omens for an immediate impact didn’t look good. I can remember standing on the North Bank at Upton Park on a cold rainy day the previous December and watching in horror as City gave us a 4-0 thrashing. Contrary to popular belief among younger West Ham followers, Upton Park was never a fortress, and that day the atmosphere reached quite a low point. Ironically I can remember us having quite a lot of the game (they didn’t have possession statistics in those days so I have to rely on memory), and we created a number of chances to score with shots rebounding off the woodwork, and goalmouth scrambles.

On a quagmire of a pitch Francis Lee scored the only goal of the first half with a long range shot along the ground, and I can remember watching the Big Match the following day and Brian Moore’s comments along the lines of a suspicion that Bobby Ferguson was a little slow at getting down to it. In modern day parlance we would have said that he would have been disappointed to let it in. A young Ian Bowyer scored two headers in the second half, one from at least a dozen yards out, and the other resulting from non-existent West Ham marking. Doyle scored City’s fourth goal with a long range effort where Ferguson didn’t move. I’m sure he would have been disappointed with his effort to save once again!

So could Greaves inspire us in the return fixture three months later? You bet he could. He had a record of always scoring in his first game for new clubs and at all international levels and he didn’t disappoint. On a pitch that was even more of a quagmire than we saw at Upton Park in December he bagged two goals as did Geoff Hurst, although the game is remembered for a Ronnie Boyce volley from around the half-way line, returning Joe Corrigan’s clearance with interest. We won the game 5-1, astonishingly outperforming City’s win on our ground.

Now you would think that to win 5-1 at City is something that would happen once in a blue moon (sorry, I had to get that in somewhere!), but it wasn’t that unusual in that era! When I was a young boy (in the 1961-62 season) we won our away fixture at Maine Road by 5-3! Ironically we also lost the home game against them that season by 4-0!

Moving on to the following season (1962-63), we did even better winning 6-1 at Maine Road. A young Geoff Hurst, wearing the number 10 shirt for only the second time after being converted from a wing-half into a striker by Ron Greenwood, scored his first ever away goal in that game. In the final game of the season we repeated the early season victory winning 6-1 yet again, condemning City to relegation. Geoff Hurst scored twice this time, and finished the campaign with 15 goals in 29 appearances. As a wing-half the previous season he had netted just once in 24 games. We had unearthed a new goalscorer, and the rest (they say) is history.

Following the 5-1 success in 1970, we haven’t done too well in away fixtures at City since. Our next league win there came in 1982 when Paul Goddard scored the only goal of the game. And then we had to wait until the twenty-first century (2003) before another away win there when Freddie Kanoute scored the only goal of the game in our magnificent end of season revival under caretaker manager Sir Trev, which narrowly failed to keep us up, despite winning six and drawing four of our final eleven games. The damage had been done earlier in the season when we occupied a relegation place almost throughout.

Fast forward to the last season at the Boleyn (2015-16) for the next (and our last) win at City, and our first league win at the Etihad. When we met them early in that season we had already won our away games at Arsenal and Liverpool, so why not add City to the list? Moses and Sakho scored our goals past Joe Hart early in the game, with De Bruyne pulling one back just before half time. The expected onslaught came in the second half but we held firm. The statistics for that match made interesting reading, with City “beating us” 672-279 in passes, 16-3 in corners, 27-6 in shots, 89%-68% in pass accuracy, 50-7 in crosses, 66%-34% first half possession, and 78%-22% in second half possession. I don’t think that they had that nonsensical statistic of “expected goals” at the time, but it reinforces the fact that these statistics are a mere indicator of what has happened; it is only goals scored and conceded that really matters at the end of the day.

So, just three league wins at City since Jimmy Greaves made his debut for us all those years ago. A lot of water has gone under the bridge since then, with the financial aspect in English football being (almost) the over-riding factor in the success or otherwise of clubs at the top. It is no coincidence that the six biggest clubs in terms of revenue will finish (once again) in the top six places in the Premier League. City are one of those clubs and have had a lot of success in recent years. After a mid-season wobble they have almost recovered the ground on Liverpool, and I believe that they will go on to retain the title that they won last May with a record points tally. It will be closer this time, but with the depth of their squad I can see them coming out ahead of the nervous Merseysiders.

I have read some West Ham fans on social media talking up our chances tonight due to the fact that City went to extra time on Sunday before winning the Carabao Cup, the first of four possible trophies that they could win this season. The bookmakers don’t give us much of a chance with odds of around 18/1 on a victory (as high as 7/1 on a draw), and West Ham wins with a score of 1-0 or 2-1 around 50/1, or 2-0 around 100/1! It is quite an indictment of football in this country, and the Premier League in particular, that the team sitting in second place, playing at home to another team in the top half of the table, should be such overwhelming favourites to win the game. Of course upsets can happen, and we almost managed it last season, but it looks a tall order to say the least.

Nevertheless I shall have a small wager on a 2-1 West Ham win at 50/1 to repeat our last victory there. I’ll also have another fun bet on Arnie to score the first goal in the game, with Kompany to receive the first card in the game. I’ve got odds of 200/1 on that one. What are the chances? There are words in the lyrics of Blue Moon about saying a prayer I believe. We need to do that. I’m sure that the bookmakers have got it about right, but you have to dream, don’t you?

You start to see the pressure on football managers when things start to go wrong. After an uninspiring draw against Leicester, most people fully expected Liverpool to bounce back and see off an out of form West Ham on Monday evening. But the Hammers being the Hammers lived up to their reputation of consistent inconsistency. How could a team who performed so miserably as to be dumped out of the FA Cup by lowly AFC Wimbledon, and then play even more abjectly (some would argue) against Wolves, possibly be a match for top of the table Liverpool? It is an easy one to answer. As I have written so many times before, with West Ham you never know what you are going to get. It is the West Ham way!

Considering how out of touch we had been in the matches leading up to this we performed admirably. It is hard enough to take on the top of the table team anyway without being subjected to one of the most appalling offside decisions (or rather lack of decision) that you will ever see. We were easily holding our own, and probably had the upper hand in the game when Milner, clearly in an offside position, received the ball from Lallana. He crossed to Mane who turned and scored. I’ve been writing about the need for VAR for years, and in this case, the “goal” would have comfortably been chalked off. But worse than that is the failure of the linesman to be able to see it with his eyes. Sometimes offside decisions can be difficult to call, and you cannot blame the linesman when the human eye only has fractions of inches to differentiate between offside and not offside. But this was not one of those occasions. The linesman seemed more interested in watching Lallana’s skill on the ball and found himself in the wrong position. Shocking.

What I found just as bad was the decision (or lack of it again) in the third minute of time added on, when the other linesman did not raise his flag when Origi was also clearly offside and should have put the ball in the net to win the match. That would have really compounded the injustice, but fortunately the Liverpool substitute demonstrated why he isn’t in the starting eleven.

But perhaps the most appalling aspect of the poor decisions made by the officials was listening to Klopp afterwards complaining about the referee favouring West Ham! In my opinion he had a nerve. I guess he was just trying to deflect the attention away from his players who had been outplayed by West Ham. We had the most shots on goal and deserved our point at the very least, but could easily have had all three points. Noble should definitely have scored in the second half after fine work by Anderson, and Rice once again missed a header on the stroke of half time that you would have expected him to score.

But all in all it was an excellent performance against the team on top of the league. Klopp made further excuses about injuries. But has he seen our first team squad injury list? The pressure looks like it is beginning to tell on Liverpool, and Manchester City, after recovering from their recent blip, may well have the ability to retain their title.

The Daily Telegraph had an interesting feature this week where they compared the progress of teams in the Premier League by assessing how many points they have attained at this stage of the season set against how many they had at exactly the same time in the last campaign. Liverpool top this “league” with +12, followed by Tottenham (+9), Watford (+7), and then we are one of three teams on +5 (with Arsenal and Bournemouth). Five teams have fewer points than at this stage last season with Huddersfield (-13), Burnley (-11), Manchester City (-7), Manchester United (-5), and Leicester (-2) showing their lack of progress. Having said that, Manchester City had a record breaking campaign last time, and may still win the title, without reaching the heights that they did then. They seem to have the strongest squad, and may be too strong for a nervous Liverpool team.

Today’s opponents sit 14^th in the league just two places and six points below us, but only four points above the drop zone. Their next few games will decide whether they join us in the mid-table pack, or take part in the relegation dogfight. There are currently six teams in that contest who are not averaging a point a game, with Palace just above them. Their seven wins this season have been against Fulham (twice), Huddersfield, Burnley, Leicester, and most impressive of all, away wins at Wolves and Manchester City.

In fact they have picked up more points on their travels than at Selhurst Park, where they have only won three of their twelve home games. In those dozen games they have only scored 8 goals (and conceded 11), making games on their home ground the least entertaining in the Premier League in terms of goals by some margin. Away from home they have scored more than twice as many goals (and conceded more than twice as many also!). A worrying statistic is that Palace have only once this season recorded back to back victories. As they beat Fulham in their last game, this gives them the opportunity to double this.

Our head to head record against Palace is a positive one, and in fact the last seven games have resulted in wins for us or drawn games. Our last four visits to Selhurst Park have resulted in three wins and a draw. It should really have been four wins (oh Michail, why didn’t you take the ball into the corner?).

Apparently Arnautavic is now fit to resume his place in the squad, but can he displace Chicarito in the starting eleven, after the Mexican had one of his best games for us against Liverpool? They could be selected to play together but I believe that would upset the balance of the team. With the continued absence of so many players I expect the team to be as follows:

Fabianski;
Fredericks (or Zabaleta), Diop, Ogbonna, Cresswell;
Rice, Noble, Snodgrass;
Antonio, Anderson;
Chicarito (or Arnautavic)

Our old boys, Tompkins and Kouyate are both doubtful due to injuries, but I notice that Zaha can play as he is in the process of challenging his ban for ironically applauding the referee who sent him off in a recent game. If his finishing could match his approach play then he would be some player but he has not been able to do this. Another statistic I noticed was that in the past two years the Palace penalty taker, Milivojevic, has scored 15 penalties, which puts him way ahead of all the other teams’ penalties in the league. I wonder how many of those kicks were awarded for fouls on Zaha?

In three of our last four visits to Selhurst Park there have been four goals scored in each match. Despite the dearth of goals at that ground in this season’s games I fully expect another four this time. If we are serious about pushing upwards to join the race for seventh place then this game is one we need to win, and I expect a 3-1 victory if we can reproduce the form of the Liverpool game. If we are not quite on the ball then there could be a repeat of last season’s 2-2 draw. And if the West Ham of the Wimbledon / Wolves games turns up then we could be on the receiving end of a 3-1 defeat.

If you fancy a small wager on our team then you can get 27/10 on a West Ham victory. A 3-1 win has odds of 28/1, and a 3-1 win with Issa Diop the unlikely scorer of the last goal in the match you can get odds of 1250/1. Any one of those three outcomes, or all three of them will do for me.

When I began to take an interest in football in the late 1950’s I have to confess I didn’t take a lot of notice of Liverpool as they were not a top flight team at the time. I was vaguely aware of them in the early sixties when I was updating my football league ladders (given away by comics at the time) as they were prominent in Division Two, and since they were champions of that league in 1961-62 they have barely looked back. It is not as if they hadn’t had success in football prior to then, as they had been winners of the First Division title five times before, beginning in the very early twentieth century, and for the fifth time just after the Second World War.

They had been going through a lean period by their standards, having been relegated in the 1950’s, and when they were knocked out of the FA Cup in 1958-59 by non-league Worcester City, they appointed a new Scottish manager, Bill Shankly, who became a club legend that completely transformed their fortunes, and since that time they have barely looked back. Following their promotion to the top tier they finished a creditable eighth in their first season, and then in 1963-64 they were league champions. This was therefore their sixth title, but now their record stands as champions of England 18 times. Bearing in mind that the last of these was in 1990, this demonstrates their dominance of English football throughout the sixties, and especially in the 1970s and 1980s. They go into tonight’s game two points clear at the top with a game in hand, desperately seeking their first title for almost thirty years.

When we won the FA Cup in 1964, Liverpool had never won it at the time, but they did the year after, and their record now stands as having lifted the trophy 7 times. They have also been England’s most successful team in Europe and from the 1970s onwards they have won the European Cup or UEFA Champions League five times and the UEFA Cup three times.

Given this historical background it will come as no surprise that our head to head record against the Merseysiders is not an impressive one. They have beaten us 74 times to our 28, and in the twenty-first century we have only won 7 of the 34 meetings. In fact the last four games between the sides have been disastrous for us with Liverpool winning all of them and scoring four goals in each game. No team has ever scored four goals or more against a specific opponent on five consecutive occasions in the top flight since Arsenal managed the feat in the 1930s. Oh dear, that’s the kind of statistic I shouldn’t be mentioning!

Despite our poor overall record against them we have had many memorable games against Liverpool. The two with the highest profile were both Cup Finals. In 1981 when we were a second division side we met them in the League Cup Final, and lost after a replay. In 2006, we were seconds away from a famous 3-2 victory when up stepped Steven Gerrard with a wonder goal to take the game into extra time, and we subsequently lost the penalty shoot-out. Why didn’t Lionel Scaloni put the ball high into the stands when he should have?

But enough of defeats, what about some famous victories. In 2015-16 we won 3-0 at Anfield to end one of the longest running records of defeats at that ground that stretched back to 1963. Or the season before that when we led early on 2-0, Sterling pulled one back, before Amaltifano (remember him?) scored the winner close to the end. Even in our ill-fated relegation season under Avram Grant we led 2-0, Glenn Johnson pulled one back, and then Carlton Cole scored the winner with a scorching left-footed strike. I can even remember back to 1982-83 when we led 2-0, Liverpool pulled one back through Souness, and then Sandy Clark scored to give us a 3-1 win. You can probably see a pattern emerging here. We lead 2-0, Liverpool pull one back and then we score the winner. It has happened more than once!

Delving through my football programme collection I came across the one pictured above from 50 years ago this month. I recall the game clearly as I stood on the North Bank with friends on a very sunny Saturday afternoon. West Ham took the lead in the first half when, after some excellent work out wide on the right by Geoff Hurst, he crossed the ball for John Sissons to slam high into the net in front of the South Bank. Liverpool’s equaliser came at the same end in the second half, when after excellent wing play from Ian Callaghan, he crossed the ball for Roger Hunt to head home. I remember thinking at the time that Bobby Ferguson should perhaps have done a better job at keeping it out. The game ended 1-1. Liverpool finished as runners-up to Leeds that season, although neither of them scored more goals than we did (66). However their combined goals conceded (50) matched ours exactly, highlighting that our problems at the time were nothing to do with scoring goals, but more as a result of conceding them.

We have just 14 games left this season; what have we got to play for other than pride and finishing as high in the table as we can? We are now 7 points adrift of Wolves who lie seventh, so we’ll struggle to finish at the top of the clubs beginning with W even. We have a lengthy injury list – this is one area where we are the top team in the Premier League, and the bookmakers have us at 7/1 or thereabouts to win tonight’s game. Liverpool have won 19 of their 24 games this season losing just one (to Manchester City) so those odds are not realistic, they should be much longer.

But for no logical reason football sometimes provides us with an upset. Perhaps this evening we will go into a 2-0 lead, Liverpool will then score to set up an exciting climax, but we will then grab a winner. 3-1 to West Ham. The odds on us winning the game by that score are around 60/1. I can dream, can’t I?