Richard Bennett

West Brom Preview

Can we reverse the result at the Hawthorns in September?

West Ham West Brom

An excellent victory at St Mary’s last weekend saw us move up into ninth place in the table, which if we maintained that place would equate to prize money of £24 million at the end of the season. According to reports in the media, Slaven Bilic will be offered a new contract if we finish eighth or above this season. The question I ask is – how does information such as this find its way into the media? Does somebody guess, and then the rumour spreads like a lot of fake news these days? Or does it get deliberately leaked by somebody? He may have some tactical shortcomings, but Bilic is adored by the majority of fans according to various polls, and I find it hard to believe that our board will dispense with his services provided that we don’t collapse between now and the end of the season. A top half finish is well within our grasp, and we can go some way towards pushing upwards for an eighth place finish if we can beat West Brom this weekend.

In many ways, the Baggies are the surprise team this season. The top six were very predictable, and it is no real shock to see Everton in seventh, but West Brom eighth was not one that many could see coming. But in eighth position they are, and five points clear of ninth (us) at that, so they will be working extra hard to ensure that we don’t beat them and close the gap to two. One of the best games of football I ever saw was on Good Friday in 1965. We beat West Brom 6-1 but I’ll save the details for another article in my series on favourite games. They were a top tier team throughout the 1960s like ourselves, and we often gave them a thrashing at Upton Park.

In the last 25 years the Baggies have not had a great deal of success. When the Premier League began in 1992, we missed out on being one of the teams taking part in the first season as we were in the second tier. Albion were in a worse position than ourselves as they were even lower; they were a third tier team (the equivalent of League One today). Throughout the twenty-first century they have been the archetypal yo-yo club. Promotion to the Premier League in 2001-2 was followed by relegation the following season (2002-3). They came back up as a result of a successful campaign in 2003-4, and famously avoided relegation the following season with their version of “The Great Escape” when they became the first club to be bottom of the Premier League at Christmas, but stay up, which they achieved on the final day. It didn’t last though as they went down again in 2005-6, came back up in 2007-8, were relegated in 2008-9, and then won promotion yet again in 2009-10. Now that is the definition of a yo-yo club if ever I’ve seen one.

They have retained their position in the top league since then, and this is now their seventh successive season in the Premier League. They will be delighted with how it has gone so far, and early murmurs about the Pulis style of play have evaporated as they have climbed the table with a reasonably attractive style of football (well attractive by Pulis standards, anyway). Their ten wins, six draws and just eight defeats leave them on 36 points, just short of the magical 40 that all clubs aim for, although in truth 36 is often enough (but not in 2002-3, I hear you say!). A bit like ourselves, they could be described as flat-track bullies, in that they haven’t beaten any of the seven sides above them in the table. Away from home they have won three games at Palace, Leicester and Southampton. Of course their seven home wins include beating us comfortably 4-2 in September, after being three up at half-time, and four ahead shortly afterwards as a result of some comedy defending. It certainly wasn’t Masuaku’s finest hour in a claret and blue shirt.

The weather forecast is for another cold day so I’ll be wearing my hat (yes my optimistic West Ham one) and hoping for another victory, perhaps by the odd goal in three? If we can beat them, then there is every chance that we can push them for their position in the table. If we don’t win, then with games beginning to run out this season (just 13 to go after this one), it will be harder, though not impossible, to bridge the gap.

The Lawro Challenge – Week 25

The battle at the top of the Lawro Challenge table hots up as we reach week 25.

Lawro Crystal Ball Twenty-four rounds of games in the Premier League have now been completed. That means we have now predicted the results of 240 matches.

In Week 24, Rich scored 7 points, Geoff 6 points, and Lawro 5 points. Rich has narrowly regained his place at the top of the leaderboard, but the competition is well and truly on.

In this challenge we award one point for a correct result, and a further two points (making three in total) if the score prediction is spot on.

We now proceed to week 25.

	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
Total after 23 weeks	185	143	186
Score in week 24	7	6	5
Total after 24 weeks	192	149	191

Predictions – Week 25
	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
Saturday
Arsenal v Hull	2-0	3-1	2-0
Man U v Watford	2-0	1-0	2-0
Middlesbrough v Everton	1-1	1-0	1-1
Stoke v Palace	2-0	0-0	2-1
Sunderland v Southampton	1-1	2-1	1-0
West Ham v West Brom	2-1	3-0	1-1
Liverpool v Tottenham	1-1	1-2	1-1
Sunday
Burnley v Chelsea	1-2	1-1	0-2
Swansea v Leicester	2-1	1-2	1-1
Monday
Bournemouth v Man City	1-2	0-3	0-2

My Favourite Games: Number 4 – West Ham 4:2 Manchester United, May 16 1977

A series of occasional articles recalling my favourite West Ham games, and songs that topped the charts when these games were played

There have been so many great games in the last 58 years and I’ve covered many of them throughout my book, Goodbye Upton Park, Hello Stratford. So many of them are remembered because of the importance of the game, the goals scored, and the spine-tingling atmosphere generated by our fans. Hopefully my memories of these great games will evoke fond memories of fans, (especially older ones like me!), and the music in the charts at the time.

Man Utd 1977

One of the best games of football that I can remember, and certainly one of those with the most incredible atmosphere, came in the last game of the 1976-77 season. United were back again as a force in the top flight and we were facing relegation. It was a Monday night and United were playing in the FA Cup final the following Saturday. The equation was simple. If we won the game we would be safe. I met (lifelong friend and co-weblogger) Geoff Hopkins after work, and we stood on the West Stand Lower Terrace to watch the game. Considering the importance of the game, it was surprising that fewer than 30,000 were there to see it. I guess it was a sign of the times. We had only won two of our previous 13 games, leaving us in this precarious position, although in truth we had spent most of the season in the bottom three.

If we thought that United would be taking it easy with the cup final just a few days later we had another think coming. Firstly they fielded a virtually full strength team, and secondly within 30 seconds of the start their left winger Gordon Hill gave them a 1-0 lead. Frank Lampard (senior of course) scored the equaliser in the first half, yet another of his important goals, and then shortly before half time we were awarded a penalty. With Pop Robson in the team I’m not sure how a young Geoff Pike came to be the penalty taker, but he had scored twice from the spot in the previous month and he stepped up to take the kick. Unfortunately his fierce shot sailed high over the bar and we went into the break at 1-1. Fortunately he atoned for the miss early in the second half when he scored a tremendous goal to put us ahead. Pop Robson made it 3-1 to ease the nerves before Stuart Pearson (later to join us) pulled one back. Robson scored again to ensure a 4-2 victory that kept us in the First Division. Our stay in the top flight only lasted into the next season, as we were relegated after another dismal year when we barely got out of the bottom three for the whole time. Once again we could have saved ourselves from the drop in the final game but a 2-0 defeat at home to Liverpool sealed our fate and we went down for the first time in my life.

The number one in the charts that week was Free, by Deniece Williams. Other notable chart songs in May 1977 were Stevie Wonder with Sir Duke, Rod Stewart with I Don’t Want To Talk About It (which was the number one the following week), Abba with Knowing Me, Knowing You (not by A-ha!), Hotel California by the Eagles, Good Morning Judge by 10CC, and Lucille by Kenny Rogers, which took over at number one after Rod Stewart’s three weeks at the top. Even though it was almost 40 years ago, I can recall practically all the songs in that chart, unlike my non-existent memory of the May 2016 chart recalled in Number 3, the final game at Upton Park, also against Manchester United.

A Poll of Player Ratings from the Southampton Game

Rating the Ratings. How different people viewed individual West Ham performances at the weekend.

Football Stats When I was young (I’m talking about between the ages of around 8 to 11, so over 50 years ago) I used to badger my dad to buy the People newspaper every Sunday. Apart from liking their match reports, they were the only paper (to my limited knowledge at the time) who gave the players ratings out of 10 for the game played the day before. You have to remember that all games were 3pm kick offs on a Saturday at that time, so apart from midweek games, I was able to collate the figures for most of the West Ham games throughout the season. I used to painstakingly write out on a schedule the subjective scores of the reporter at the game, and then as the season progressed I would calculate the averages. In this way I believed I was working out which players were the best. I didn’t keep my schedules, although I can recall that Bobby Moore and Johnny Byrne always figured highly at the time.

Now I haven’t really taken too much notice of player ratings since that time all those years ago, but it did occur to me that more and more publications, both newspapers and websites, seem to be giving players scores for their performances. Some of this is done for the purposes of fantasy leagues, dream leagues etc, and some for the purposes of the supposedly ever increasing demand for football statistics. Understanding the subjectivity involved, I decided to analyse some ratings that I researched when looking at the performances of individual West Ham players in our win on Saturday at Southampton. I looked at eight sets of scores, including those by my fellow web co-blogger Geoff, to see how much correlation there was in the figures. I was surprised by the consistency of what I found. I was expecting greater variation knowing how people tend to see games differently.

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	A	B	C
Randolph	6	7	7	7.5	6	6	7	7	53.5	40.0	6.67
Kouyate	6	7	7	6.5	5	2	5	7	45.5	36.5	6.08
Reid	7	6	7	6.5	6	5	6	7	50.5	38.5	6.42
Fonte	7	6	7	5	6	5	6	7	49.0	37.0	6.17
Cresswell	6	6	6	6	7	7	7	7	52.0	39.0	6.50
Antonio	6	7	6	6.5	5	6	6	7	49.5	37.5	6.25
Noble	7	7	7	7	7	7	7	8	57.0	42.0	7.00
Obiang	9	9	9	8	8	8	8	9	68.0	51.0	8.50
Feghouli	6	6	5	6	6	6	6	6	47.0	36.0	6.00
Snodgrass	7	6	6	7	7	7	7	7	54.0	41.0	6.83
Carroll	8	7	8	7	7	7	7	8	59.0	44.0	7.33
	75	74	75	73	70	66	72	80	585	442.5	6.70

1 – Geoff Hopkins, Under The Hammers
2 – The Sun
3 – ReadWestHam
4 – The Mail on Sunday
5 – ESPN
6 – Football Insider
7 – Sky
8 – Outside 90

The eight sets of scores are listed above. I have only used the scores awarded to the eleven starting players. Of course, when I used to look at the data fifty years ago, there were only eleven players in each game as no substitutes were allowed at the time.

Column A is the total of the eight scores. Using standard statistical analysis to remove some element of bias / unusual scoring, Column B is Column A minus the highest and lowest score awarded to each individual player. For example, the Football Insider score for Kouyate is way out of line compared to the rest of the scores, so this “unusual” score is eliminated from the calculations. Column C is the average score for each player based upon the six “middle” scores, i.e Column B divided by 6.

The resulting table below is the final score for each player in descending order:

1	Obiang	8.50
2	Carroll	7.33
3	Noble	7.00
4	Snodgrass	6.83
5	Randolph	6.67
6	Cresswell	6.50
7	Reid	6.42
8	Antonio	6.25
9	Fonte	6.17
10	Kouyate	6.08
11	Feghouli	6.00

Unsurprisingly, Obiang was considered our player of the match as he was the top scorer in each of the eight sets of scores. His average was well ahead of Carroll who was second, and Noble in third. Feghouli finished at the bottom, although he still scored an average of 6.00. The average for the team using this calculation was 6.70.

It was just a bit of fun, but does give the thoughts of eight individuals subjectively analysing player performances in the game. Pedro Obiang is my player of the season to date, and his performance in this game reinforces my belief. I think, but I am not 100% certain, that he is the only West Ham player to score a goal and create an assist in the same game in the whole of this season. I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m wrong!

Southampton 1, West Ham 3

A good performance to reverse the result at the London Stadium in September

noble

As always, co-weblogger Geoff summarised the game excellently in his article on the game published in Under The Hammers on Sunday: 5 Observations from Victory at St Marys. We were seeking revenge for our early season defeat at the hands of Southampton, and achieved it well.

Throughout this blog we have commented on the plethora of statistics surrounding football and I’ll add some more today.

In the Hull v Liverpool game, Liverpool “won” the possession statistics 72% to 28%, the shots 11 to 7, completed passes 523 to 162, and the pass success 82% to 62%. You all know the score of the game. Hull 2, Liverpool 0.

In the Palace v Sunderland game, Palace “won” the possession statistics 65% to 35%, the shots 17 to 10, completed passes 399 to 195, and the pass success 81% to 71%. You all know the score of the game. Palace 0, Sunderland 4.

In the Everton v Bournemouth game, Bournemouth “won” the possession statistics 54% to 46%, the shots 16 to 12, completed passes 476 to 391, and the pass success 86% to 82%. The final score was Everton 6, Bournemouth 3.

In the West Brom v Stoke game, Stoke “won” the possession statistics 62% to 38%, completed passes 416 to 220, and the pass success 81% to 70%. The final score was West Brom 1, Stoke 0.

In the Chelsea v Arsenal game, Arsenal “won” the possession statistics 59% to 41%, completed passes 475 to 326, and the pass success 84% to 80%. And the game ended Chelsea 3, Arsenal 1.

And finally in our game, Southampton v West Ham, Southampton “won” the possession statistics 55% to 45%, the shots 18 to 5, completed passes 388 to 296, and the pass success 82% to 76%. You all know the score of the game of course. Southampton 1, West Ham 3.

I think that I have proved my point! The TV and written media love to show us these statistics when a game is in progress (sometimes they give you the last ten minutes), and at the end of the match. So what do they prove? Of course it doesn’t always happen this way. Sometimes the team with the most possession and pass success rate will win the game.

I’ll leave you to judge the relationship between the data and the outcome of games. I’ve picked out six of the eight games played on Saturday in this last weekend. I suppose losing managers can hide behind the data to try to prove that they were unlucky. But the only meaningful statistic is goals scored. In each of the games I’ve highlighted the team that “won” in terms of the data lost the game. The teams that “lost” in terms of the data were the ones who picked up the three points.

Despite the four goals scored in the game we were still as low as sixth on Match of the Day! The win was well deserved in spite of the statistics I’ve quoted above. Gabbiadini, a player we have been linked with in the media in the past, took his goal well, although he looked offside to me. I haven’t seen a replay but I’ll be amazed if he was onside.

The timing of our goals couldn’t have been much better. The equaliser from Carroll proved that his right foot isn’t just for standing on, and he coolly slotted the ball home just a minute or two after we had gone behind. Obiang has been threatening to score for a long while now, and his goal on the stroke of half-time was well struck from outside the area. And finally Mark Noble’s free kick, as the Saints were threatening to get back into the game early in the second half, was rightly credited to him, despite taking a deflection of a Southampton boot. The “rules” of goals accreditation work on the basis that if the ball was bound for the goal, then even if it is deflected off a defender, the goal is given to the player who shot. It would have only been given as an own goal if Noble’s shot was deemed to not be heading into the goal.

Three more points and ninth in the table. We have a very important game at home to West Brom next, where a win would help enormously if we want to close the gap on them.

I Wouldn’t Bet On It 30

A good decision to not stake too much on the City game!

Fancy A Bet

Our 10 point stake was blown out of the water in the first half on Wednesday night bringing our balance down to 120 points. We now face an away game at Southampton and remember that they beat us convincingly 3-0 earlier this season at the London Stadium. Nobody really expects us to win on Saturday, including me, but I refuse to bet against us, so my stakes on Saturday will be:

4 points on West Ham to win the game @15/4 (19)
2 points on the game ending as a score draw @4/1 (10)
1 point on Antonio to score the first goal and the game to end 1-1 @50/1 (51)

And then 3 fun accumulators:

1 point – A double on the Southampton v West Ham and West Brom v Stoke games to both end in score draws @22.5/1 (23.5)
1 point – A four game accumulator on the above two games plus Hull v Liverpool and Leicester v Man Utd – all four games to end as score draws @619/1 (620)
1 point – A six game accumulator for the following six teams to win this weekend: Chelsea, Palace, Everton, Watford, Tottenham and Man City @ 17/1 (18)

Total stake 10 points, bringing our balance down to 110 points. Potential returns if correct in brackets.

Southampton Preview

Can we reverse the result at the London Stadium in September?

Southampton West Ham

We move on to game twenty-four in our topsy-turvy season. We have a trip to the St Mary’s stadium on the south coast to face a Southampton side whose season has been just as inconsistent as our own. Anybody who saw them beat us convincingly 3-0 in the sixth game of the season, at which point they had a five point lead over us in the table, would be surprised that they now sit one place and one point below us in that congested area which sees Stoke in 9^th place on 29 points and Bournemouth in 14^th on 26. We are 11^th on 28 points, at a midpoint of nine points below Everton who currently sit in our finishing place last season (7^th), and nine points above the drop zone.

It is highly unlikely that we can improve enough to move upwards to finish 7^th as we did last season, and improbable that we can implode to finish in the drop zone either. So mid-table obscurity is the order of the day, and an exit from cup competitions means that we have little to play for other than pride, and to finish as high as possible to earn financial rewards that are based on finishing positions.

Realistically, based on our performances to date, our final finishing position is very likely to be somewhere between 9^th and 14^th, so the six clubs in that band, Stoke, Burnley, West Ham, Southampton, Watford and Bournemouth, separated by just three points, are in a mini-league hoping to finish at the top (i.e 9^th). These six teams can perhaps be considered to have performed the most inconsistently this season, and all six have lost more games than they have won, without being that bad to be considered relegation candidates.

The prize money for a 9^th place finish is £24 million, and drops by £2m for each position, down to £14million for finishing 14^th. The difference of £10 million is sufficient to buy you another solid Premier League footballer (such as Robert Snodgrass, for example) who will help you to retain a mid-table position the following season, but not enough to buy any players to take us to the next level.

So the games against the other five teams in my mini-league take on added significance, and we have yet to play all of them for a second time this season, and the first of these games is on Saturday. We have already met all five of them at home, so they are all away games between now and the end of the season.

Our opponents on Saturday have beaten seven teams so far, Swansea, Burnley, Everton, Middlesbrough, Bournemouth and Leicester, in addition to ourselves. By the middle of December they had only lost five times, but a very poor run since then has seen them lose five of their last six league games. Their only win in that time was a 3-0 win over Leicester in their last but one game.

Of the six aforementioned teams in my mini-league, only Burnley and Leicester are still in the FA Cup, although Southampton have performed well in the EFL Cup to reach the final where they will take on Manchester United at the end of February. It is surprising to me as to how many of them fielded weakened teams in the FA Cup competition this season. None of them were in a position to challenge for a European place, and none of them were likely to be involved in the relegation dogfight. Surely they owed it to their fans to try to win the FA Cup? Fans will remember a visit to Wembley to contest the FA Cup final for years to come, but they won’t remember the difference between finishing 9^th and 14^th in the Premier League. We can exclude ourselves of course. We put out a strong team but were still battered by a rampant Manchester City team in the third round!

So what will happen when we take on one of the other “inconsistent” teams this weekend? To be quite frank I haven’t a clue. Based on current league form since around mid-December, we have performed better in our last eight games than our opponents, winning five of them to their two victories. But for many of those we weren’t that impressive, but nonetheless they were victories. On the other hand Southampton will remember their victory at our place earlier in the season.

We were both promoted to the Premier League in 2012 and have met nine times since then. We have won three times (all at home), they have won three (including two at our place), and three have been drawn (two of them goalless). We last won on their ground in November 2000, more than sixteen years ago, when goals from Kanoute, Stuart Pearce, and Sinclair, helped us to a 3-2 victory.

The smart money (according to the bookmakers) is on a home win, with Southampton odds-on to collect three points. I hope that we can prove them wrong and win there for the first time in a long while, but realistically I predict a 1-1 draw, replicating the score in the game in April 2013, and an important point against one of the other teams in the race to finish 9^th! On that day less than four years ago, Andy Carroll scored our goal, and he is the only player in our team from that day who is likely to face the Saints on Saturday. How times change. Other players in the starting line-up that day included Jaaskelainen, Demel, Diame, Nolan, O’Brien, O’Neill, Jarvis, Tomkins and Vaz Te, all long gone. The only other starter on that day who could possibly play is James Collins, but I suspect he will be on the bench.

The Lawro Challenge – Week 24

The season long challenge takes an alarming twist as Lawro takes a slender lead.

Lawro Crystal Ball The whole concept behind this challenge was to prove the assertion of how hopeless Lawro was at predicting the outcome of Premier League matches. He may be able to come out on top against an assortment of minor celebrities but that was never going to be the case against a couple of seasoned and insightful football enthusiasts. Well now the unthinkable has happened and Lawro has taken a narrow lead in our season long head-to-head challenge.

Twenty-three rounds of games in the Premier League have now been completed. That means we have now predicted the results of 230 matches. In Week 23, Rich scored 5 points, Geoff 3 points, and Lawro 8 points. Lawro has hit the top of the league and holds a one point lead, with 150 matches still to forecast before the end of the season. Can he hang on at the top?

In this challenge we award one point for a correct result, and a further two points (making three in total) if the score prediction is spot on.

We now proceed to week 24.

	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
Total after 22 weeks	180	140	178
Score in week 23	5	3	8
Total after 23 weeks	185	143	186

Predictions – Week 24
	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
Saturday
Chelsea v Arsenal	2-1	1-2	2-0
Palace v Sunderland	2-1	1-1	2-1
Everton v Bournemouth	2-0	3-1	2-0
Hull v Liverpool	1-1	0-2	0-2
Southampton v West Ham	1-1	0-1	2-1
Watford v Burnley	2-1	2-0	1-1
West Brom v Stoke	1-1	2-2	2-1
Tottenham v Middlesbrough	2-0	3-0	2-0
Sunday
Man City v Swansea	3-1	5-0	3-0
Leicester v Man United	1-1	0-2	1-1

West Ham 0:4 Manchester City

The Premier League gap is getting wider.

Embed from Getty Images

The top six teams in the Premier league are a long way ahead of the remaining fourteen. It is just as if there are two competitions. The points difference is vast, as is the revenue that they generate. The quality of footballer from all over the world that the top six teams are able to attract means that the others just cannot compete. Sure, the top teams do have off days and suffer the occasional defeat to one of the lesser teams, but that happens rarely these days. And when it does happen, the manager of the lesser team usually manages to come up with a plan to stop the big team playing. If they are frustrated for long enough, and if they are having an off-day, then the big team can lose. But just take a look at the league table. It tells the whole story of how money influences football these days. And the Financial Fair Play rules don’t help either.

But what about last season I hear you say? Little Leicester broke the mould and romped away with the title. Yes, I have to admit that was the case, but I believe it was the combination of three outstanding players (Kante, Mahrez and Vardy) hitting a purple streak of form, the other players in the team all playing above themselves for a long period, and the top teams all having an off-season at the same time. I don’t think we will ever see it happen again. Well perhaps there may be another freak year, but I honestly don’t expect to see it. And look where Leicester are now. Just a couple of points above the drop zone in the second half of the following season. Normal service has been resumed.

The rich clubs are getting richer, and the gap from the others is widening all the time. It would take the injection of serious money into one of the teams outside of this elite to give them any sort of chance of competing. Our current owners are very rich men by British standards, but are not in the same league as the foreign owners of the top teams. I’m not knocking them, and I am grateful that they came in when they did. They do their best and they are fans. But while they are in charge we will not be able to bridge the gap; a fact that they themselves have admitted in that they say they will only sell to mega-rich buyers who can inject the sort of money that they cannot, to take us to another level.

Geoff summed up the game perfectly in his article Five Observations From City Humiliation. Unfortunately, positives from the game were few and far between. Carroll lacked any real support, although Antonio covered every blade of grass in an attempt to help him up front. Randolph couldn’t be faulted for any of the goals conceded, Reid had a steady game, and Snodgrass looked lively when he came on.

Most of the others had poor games. Obiang has been excellent lately and I will excuse him on this one, although his poor pass led directly to their third goal. Not that it really mattered by then. I don’t know what has happened to Cresswell this season. His performances have generally been very poor and his two memorable contributions last night were a woeful pass that led to the first goal, and then missing the target by miles when put through by Carroll for our only clear opening in the game. I cannot see him getting anywhere near future England squads if he continues as he has for most of this season.

When you play against teams such as Manchester City, Arsenal, Tottenham or Chelsea, who all move the ball at pace, you have to develop a method of competing. One thing you cannot do is gift them the ball in midfield to set up a swift attack which invariably leads to a goal. If you can frustrate them for long enough, they can sometimes go off the boil. The one thing you must not do is concede sloppy goals. But I am afraid that is exactly what we were guilty of once again.

Although a season ticket holder I couldn’t get to the game so I had to endure the BT Sport coverage. I’m afraid that in my opinion it doesn’t come close to that provided by Sky Sports. Commentator Ian Darke should stick to boxing, and Glenn Hoddle and Owen Hargreaves were poor (a bit like us really!), as well as being factually inaccurate at times. More than once Hoddle described the pitch as vast, and said that we should reduce its size because of the way we play. Well firstly, the pitch is the regulation size that all Premier League clubs should have, provided their ground allows for it, and secondly we are not allowed to reduce it. In fact it is the same width as Upton Park and just over four metres longer. But this is just one example of some of the (in my opinion) nonsense that came from the mouths of the co-commentators and pundits on the programme.

I watched the game through to the end, unlike many thousands at the stadium who decided that they had seen enough long before the final whistle, and were trudging off to Stratford station in their droves. I felt quite deflated at our performance, but realistically it is not a competitive game when we are playing against a team who can have a player of the calibre of Aguero sitting on the bench (well, padded seat). We are nowhere near the top teams, and the best we can hope for is to play for a place in the top half, and even try to emulate last season’s seventh place finish. Even that looks unlikely with Everton too far ahead.

I’m not sure that Bilic has the tactical nous for the job, even though a large number of fans love him. It was interesting to see Roberto Mancini sitting in with the directors. I wonder if he was a guest of Manchester City who had sacked him a few seasons ago, or perhaps even a guest of our own board?

Nevertheless, ever the optimist, and a fan of almost sixty years who has seen it all before, I will take my seat for the next home game against a West Brom team on Saturday week, who, much to my surprise, Pulis has inspired to punch above their weight this season. Before then we visit Southampton this weekend, to face another of the teams aiming for seventh place, which in effect is the competition to finish top of the second tier of the Premier League.

I Wouldn’t Bet On It 29

So close to a big win, but we win anyway!

Fancy A Bet

We were within a minute of a 98 point haul with our bets on the Middlesbrough game. As a reminder they were:

9 points on West Ham to beat Middlesbrough @2/1 (27)
5 points on a draw @11/5 (16)
1 point on Andy Carroll to score the first goal and West Ham to win 2-1 @50/1 (51)
1 point on West Ham to win 2-1 @19/1 (20)

Yes, so near on three of our four bets coming in, including the big one. Nonetheless, we did have 27 points from the well-deserved win, bringing our new balance up to 130 points.

What will happen in our game against Manchester City? I haven’t got a clue. It’s only a few weeks since they well and truly outplayed us and dumped us out of the FA Cup. I am hoping that our new signings will inspire us to victory over an inconsistent City side. When they turn it on they are quite a force, but they don’t do it regularly. Hopefully they will be over confident after their recent success here.

Smaller stakes this time as follows:

West Ham to win the game, 5 points stake at 5.2/1 (Betfair) (31)
Drawn game, 3 points at 3.6/1 (Betfair) (13.8)
West Ham to win 2-1, 1 point at 18.5/1 (Betfair) (19)
2-2 draw, 1 point at 15/1 (Betfair) (16)

Total stake 10 points. Potential returns if correct in brackets.

What are the chances?