Richard Bennett

Seven games played, four points!

A review of the season to date as we go into the second international break of the season.

The first four home games of the season have been played. Bournemouth, Watford, Southampton, and finally Middlesbrough. Three games away at Chelsea, Manchester City and WBA. Before the season began, when we looked at the seven games that the fixtures computer gave us in the run-up to the second international break, how many points were we hoping for at this stage? If we were going to be making a realistic challenge towards the top, as we did last year, then I would have said a minimum of 11, and possibly anything up to 15, based on those games.

So our return of 4 is way below expectations, puts us into the relegation places, and leaves us with a fight to climb the table from this point. Our only realistic aim in the league this season is to obtain a comfortable mid-table position. Even at this early stage it would be unrealistic to even contemplate the possibility of a finishing position similar to that attained last year. Last season we had 20 points after 11 games, so we can measure ourselves against that position after the four games that come up following the resumption after this international break.

Those four games are away at Palace, who currently sit eighth in the table, and Everton who are fifth, both of whom have had good starts to the season. With our current form we wouldn’t expect to get anything out of those two games, but we really need to start to win away from home. Last season we won both of those away games, scoring three goals in each, and we must really be hoping for a repeat, however unlikely it seems at the moment.

Our run of “relatively easy” home games, you know the ones that look easier on paper, continues with the visits of Sunderland and Stoke who occupy the bottom two places in the table after seven games, with neither having managed a win yet. Of course these are games where we often don’t perform as well as we should, and in the comparative fixtures last season we only scored one goal (in the 1-0 victory over Sunderland, the Stoke game being an entertaining 0-0 draw).

So who knows what this year will bring? To bring us up to the level of averaging a point a game (which is something we need to do as soon as possible) then we would need 7 points from the four games between this break and the next, and this is the minimum that we must hope for. Because even if we have 11 points after 11 games, our next four fixtures are away games at Tottenham, Manchester United and Liverpool, and a home game against Arsenal, four of the teams currently occupying the top six places in the league.

We then return to four of the easier games on paper against teams currently in the bottom half, with home matches against Burnley and Hull, and visits to Swansea and Leicester. At that point we will be exactly half way through the season, having played 19 games, including every other team once, by 31 December. We really need to have at least 19 points by then, giving us an average of a point a game. Even with this tally we would still be in a lowly position, so let’s hope we are above that level.

Last season only the three clubs who were relegated didn’t achieve a point a game. Newcastle, who finished third from bottom had 37 points and were relegated, Sunderland just escaped with 39 points. Even a point a game is no guarantee against going down, so we must really start to improve very quickly if we don’t want to be in that position.

The Middlesbrough game was an improvement defensively, although in a creative attacking sense there is a lot more needed. Let us hope with the return to fitness of more players, and a nearly full squad to choose from, that we can start to climb the table sooner rather than later. Once teams become embroiled in the relegation dogfight, then psychologically it becomes more difficult as fear of losing inhibits performances.

On paper, when you look at our squad of players, then most people would say we are too good to go down. But that’s what they said in 2002-03. In the 2001-02 season we finished seventh, and hopes were high for the following season. But we finished third from bottom and were relegated.

Last season we also finished seventh, and hopes were high for a repeat performance this time. Let’s hope we don’t get an exact repeat of what happened following our seventh place finish in 2003!

West Ham 1 v 1 Middlesbrough Part 2

Continuing the review of the Middlesbrough game, and the season to date, as we go into the second international break of the season.

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Part Two – Pedro Obiang

From the very first time I saw Pedro Obiang pull on a claret and blue shirt last season I thought that he was just the sort of player we needed to play in front of our back four. I have always liked the all-action mobile player in that position, doing the job that Makelele used to for Chelsea, that Kante did for Leicester’s title winning team last season, and to an extent like Scott Parker did for us a few seasons back.

Every time I watched him last season I thought he did a good job, but he had few opportunities, starting around a dozen games, and coming on as a substitute even more times to try to help to close out a game that we were winning, such as the 2-1 victory over Chelsea. It must have seemed strange to him as he appeared from the bench in one season more times than he did thoroughout his time at Sampdoria.

I thought he was particularly impressive in the early season victories away at Liverpool and Manchester City, both FA Cup games against Liverpool, and especially in the home victory over Tottenham which was the beginning of the end of their title hopes. Oxford, playing in a similar role in the opening game of last season at the Emirates was equally effective.

However, the manager’s views appear to differ from my own, as evidenced by the restricted opportunities given to Obiang and Oxford in that role. This season he has started with Nordtveit filling that position, which, on the evidence to date, surprises me.

Anybody who has read my writing will know that I have championed the inclusion of Obiang in the side, and so I was pleased to see him selected to start against Middlesbrough. And I thought he was our man of the match notwithstanding Payet’s wonder goal.

What is there not to like about Pedro Obiang? He is massively reliable, consistent, composed, and provides a shield in front of the defence that has not been seen this season. He is quick, athletic, strong in the tackle, has good distribution, and for me he should be one of the first names on the team sheet.

I have written before about my reservations for statistics in football, but despite this I felt compelled to look up Pedro’s numbers for Saturday’s game to confirm my thoughts of his effectiveness. His figures for successful tackling, interceptions, clearances, and blocks made him the best West Ham player from a defensive viewpoint. In possession he made more passes than any one of our team, with greater accuracy than most. A touch map on the West Ham website that I saw shows his all-over- the-pitch, and all-round contribution in an outstanding performance both statistically, and to the naked eye.

Surely he did enough to show the manager that we need a player in this role, and that he should be first choice to fill the position. Statistically, too, our results have been better when he has been included in the team, compared to when he hasn’t been on the pitch. I may be wrong but I think that we have only lost one league match in the past twelve months when Pedro Obiang has been involved (either starting or as a substitute), and he only featured for part of that game (the 2-1 away defeat at Newcastle in February). You’ll find that the games we did lose he wasn’t involved. A co-incidence?

Trust the stats Slav! We want to see more of Pedro Obiang.

West Ham 1 v 1 Middlesbrough

A review of the Middlesbrough game, and the season to date, as we go into the second international break of the season

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Part One – I Was There

What makes a great goal? Goals can be scored in a variety of ways. A spectacular volley, a long range screamer, a team goal scored as a culmination of a number of passes, a mazy dribble where a player goes past a number of defenders before slotting the ball home, a deflection, an element of luck, a tap in; these are just some of the ways that a goal can be scored. A goal can seem greater if it is scored in an important match, or if it is a critical goal in a close match, as opposed to say one of the goals scored in a one-sided game.

And, after Saturday I will add a further enhancement. To actually be there when the goal is scored rather than just seeing it on TV adds to the greatness of the goal for the person viewing it. But however it is scored doesn’t really matter because at the end of the day, every one counts as a goal; you don’t get anything extra based on the degree of difficulty.

When I wrote my book, Goodbye Upton Park, Hello Stratford, at the end of last season, I devoted a chapter to describing the great West Ham goals that I could recall. My favourite one of all time was scored by Martin Peters v Leicester in November 1968. I stood on the North Bank behind the goal that it went in. It was a length of the field move from the goalkeeper, and culminated in a spectacular volley.

I also loved a goal I witnessed on Boxing Day 2001. We had a corner at the North Bank end taken by Sebastian Schemmel. He played the ball in the air to Joe Cole standing near the corner of the penalty area on the same side that the corner was taken. With two touches and masterful ball control, without the ball touching the ground, Joe volleyed the ball to the opposite side about ten yards from goal just beyond the six yard box. Trevor Sinclair took off and with an acrobatic scissor kick blasted the ball into the corner of the net.

Trevor scored many spectacular goals. He scored the goal of the season (and possibly the most spectacular of all time) for QPR v Barnsley before he joined us. And he scored many for us as well, including a magnificent volley against Charlton on Boxing Day again, in the year 2000.

On Saturday Dimitri Payet added to the list of great goals I have witnessed when, starting close to the touchline, he dribbled around five Middlesbrough defenders, and calmly put the ball in the net. It wasn’t just the incredible skill involved though; to some extent it was the importance of the goal. Coming on the back of four straight defeats we really needed to win this game. And although we didn’t do so, at least we stopped the rot and picked up a point against one of the teams in the lower reaches of the table.

The atmosphere in the stadium was tremendous throughout the game, and I suspect that the decibel level reached when we saw the ball nestled in the net was as high as anything I have ever experienced at a football match. I actually lost my voice on Saturday evening. But a goal is a goal. It just counts as one goal.

Around five minutes earlier, Middlesbrough had a corner which was headed straight in. To concede goals in this manner should not happen in my opinion, and if Mark Noble is meant to cover the post, then at least he should be in front of the line and not behind it. Goal line technology went against us here because I suspect that the referee and linesman, both of whom had poor games in my opinion, didn’t realise that the ball had crossed the line.

It is a goal that should not have happened but it did. I hate it when we concede a goal in this way. But it counts as one goal, just as Payet’s wonderful effort does. Those of us who were there will remember Payet’s goal for a long time, but I suspect we won’t remember the Middlesbrough one.

I Wouldn’t Bet On It 11 – Let’s Have Another Go at Goals Galore

What to do with all the loose change from down the back of the sofa?

Fancy A Bet Last week we tried out the Betfred “Goals Galore” bonus coupon that pays fixed odds based on both teams scoring at least one goal in a match. Depending upon the number of games you choose, fixed odds are paid at varying rates. On their Goals Galore Bonus coupon, which we tried, they pay 9/2 for 3 correct, 9/1 for 4 correct, and 16/1 for 5 correct, going right up to 5000/1 for 15 correct.

We selected the following games:

Bournemouth v Everton
Brighton v Barnsley
Bolton v Bradford
QPR v Birmingham
Fulham v Bristol City

It would have been difficult to have made worse selections! Despite both teams scoring in 31 out of the 46 games in the four English Leagues we only managed to select one match where both teams scored (at QPR), and even managed to select the only 0-0 draw out of all the games (at Bolton).

But we’ll have another go at this and try two batches of four games, each at 9-1, and then all eight games at 100-1. So we need both teams to score in the following games:

Group One:
West Ham v Middlesbrough
Leeds v Barnsley
Preston v Villa
Sheffield W v Brighton

Group Two:
Reading v Derby
Rotherham v Newcastle
Bury v Scunthorpe
Chesterfield v Bradford C

One point stake on each group, and one point stake on all eight games. Total 3 points.

And to finish I am convinced that West Ham will end their poor run in the game against Middlesbrough, so I’ll stake 5 points at 11/10 on a victory for us.

The balance at the start of the day was 111.1, so with a total of 8 points staked we are now down to 103.1. If everything goes our way today (a very long shot) we could win 131.5 points, but we’ll be up on the day with a West Ham victory on its own.

What are the chances?

The Lawro Challenge – Week 7

Attempting to out-predict the BBC predictor and in some cases failing miserably.

Lawro Crystal Ball We have only had six weeks so far, so if we equate this challenge to a 38 lap race (9.5 miles on a running track), then we have only completed 1.5 miles so far. We therefore have a long way to go, but the field is already beginning to be stretched. Rich is obviously intent on running the sprint finish out of the other two by setting a fast pace and has already opened up quite a lead. But has he set off too quickly? We all remember the tale of the hare and the tortoise.

On the BBC website Lawro has now lost two of his six weekly prediction encounters. Firstly he was beaten by WWE star and Hollywood actor, Dave Bautista, who hadn’t heard of some of the Premier League teams, and then last week it was the turn of the world number one darts player, Michael van Gerwen to beat him. To boost his confidence this week they’ve put him up against comedian and actor, Elis James. James took part last year and only got one result and no scores correct to give him the honour of being the lowest scorer in the whole season.

	Rich	Geoff	Lawro
Total after 5 weeks	43	33	36
Score in week 6	9	4	8
Total after 6 weeks	52	37	44

Predictions – Week 7
FRIDAY
Everton v Crystal Palace	3-2	1-1	2-1
SATURDAY
Swansea v Liverpool	1-3	1-2	0-2
Hull v Chelsea	1-3	0-3	0-2
Sunderland v West Brom	1-1	1-0	2-1
Watford v Bournemouth	1-1	2-0	1-1
West Ham v Middlesbrough	4-1	3-0	2-0
SUNDAY
Man.Utd v Stoke	3-1	3-0	2-0
Leicester v Southampton	2-2	2-1	2-1
Tottenham v Man.City	2-2	1-2	2-2
Burnley v Arsenal	1-3	0-3	0-2

West Ham v Middlesbrough Preview

Looking forward to seeing off the Boro and starting to climb the table.

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When I think back on all the games of football I’ve seen West Ham play, and the number is now approaching 1000, I find it very hard to recall many memorable games against today’s opponents. I was just four years old when we clinched promotion to the top flight in April 1958 when we beat Middlesbrough 3-1 at Ayresome Park with goals from Keeble, Dick and Musgrove. We were Division Two champions scoring over 100 goals in the process, and we were back in Division One after an absence of 25 years.

I know nothing about the game but I do remember my dad and my uncle, and various other friends of theirs celebrating long into the evening. The party at my nan’s house in Canning Town carried on long after I had been despatched to bed, but it was really the catalyst that got me into following West Ham’s results more closely the following season. Just a few months later I visited Upton Park for the first time.

Perhaps the most memorable game against Middlesbrough that I can recall was one that I watched on TV, when a Marlon Harewood goal in the FA Cup semi-final clinched our place in the final against Liverpool in 2006.

I never saw a league game against Middlesbrough until I was 20 years old because we were in the top Division and they weren’t! When they were finally promoted in 1974, after a gap of 20 years, they ran away with the Second Division title with Jack Charlton as their manager. So on a cold November day I added them to my lengthening list of clubs I’d never seen us play before, and we duly beat them 3-0. It was the first game in an unbeaten run that saw us reach fifth place by Boxing Day, although this was another of those “coming down with the Christmas decorations” seasons that saw us eventually finish 13th, although of course we were distracted by winning the FA Cup that year!

The following November we beat them again at Upton Park, but in the next two seasons we lost to them at home, and at the end of 1977-78 we were relegated ourselves. We didn’t meet them again until we were promoted back to Division One in 1981, when we beat them 3-2 but they were relegated themselves after finishing bottom, and we didn’t meet up with them again until the end of the 1980s.

We have had 20 home league games against them in my 58 years of watching West Ham and we have only lost four times, the last one being in April 2000, when in the penultimate game of the season they beat us 1-0. It was a bit of a crazy season in some respects. I particularly remember us putting five past Coventry the week before the Middlesbrough defeat. There was also the infamous 5-4 win over Bradford City where we came from behind when Di Canio and Lampard fought over taking a penalty, and we were also thrashed 7-1 at Old Trafford.

I always hate long sequences of not losing to a particular team, and Middlesbrough will believe that they have every chance of their first win at West Ham for over 16 years this weekend. But they don’t come here in the best of form either. They have only won once themselves in their first six games, beating local rivals Sunderland. They have drawn against Stoke and West Brom, and lost their last three games, to Palace, Everton and Tottenham.

I am confident that we can begin our resurgence and start to climb the table. With Swansea playing Liverpool I would hope that by 5 o’clock on Saturday we will be out of the relegation places and above both Swansea and Middlesbrough as we go into the second international break of the season.

After the break we visit Palace, then we have a home game against Sunderland. These are important games for us to pick up points, because after that we have a comparatively tough run of fixtures, where four of the next six matches are away at Everton, Tottenham, Manchester United and Liverpool, with just two home games versus Stoke and Arsenal.

Our biggest victory over Middlesbrough that I can recall was in the final game of our record breaking Premier League season of 1998-99, when two goals from Trevor Sinclair, and one each from Lampard and Keller gave us a 4-0 victory and a finishing league position of fifth place. Ever the optimist I am hoping that we can turn around our woeful start to the season and record a 4-1 victory today. What are the chances?

Counting Sheep – 7 – The Letters J, K and L

Cheating a little now as we compile the alphabetical Hammers challenge.

Counting Sheep What began as a cure for insomnia on warm summer nights has begun to turn into a bit of an obsession. It all started with me trying to select teams of West Ham players whose surnames all started with the same letter.

I’ve picked six to date, “B”, “C”, “D”, “F”, a combined “G” and “H”, and “Vowels”. Moving through the alphabet my next letter was J, and I managed to write down 10 names including two keepers. The letter “K” was slightly easier and I managed to write down the names of 13 players. But I was worried about the strength of team I could pick from these two combined, so I wrote down all the “L”s I could think of and managed 14. Putting all three together I reckon I have a team to match any of those previously picked.

Therefore my all-time West Ham “J” plus “K” plus “L” Team in a 4-4-2 formation are:

James
Johnson (G)
Lock
Konchesky
Lampard (F senior)
Lampard (F junior)
Lomas
Kouyate
Lanzini
Jennings
Kitson

So who are some of the notable names omitted? Jaaskalainen, Kurucz, Leslie and Lama are four keepers, plus Jenkinson, Jacobsen, Roger Johnson, Jimenez, Jarvis, Steve Jones, Kirkup, Kilgallon, Kitchener, Keen, Kovac, Robbie Keane, Kanoute, Keeble, David Kelly, Lindsay, Lazaridis, Lansbury, Llungberg, Lutton, Rob Lee, Elliott Lee. I remember seeing all of those at one time or another; some were better than others!

But, perhaps I’ve forgotten someone really good. Can you pick a team of J/K/L surnames to rival mine? I reckon one or two of my generation would have had Vic Keeble in their side, although I suspect not too many would select Roger Johnson or David Kelly, or even Robbie Keane on his performances for us, although he certainly had some career playing for others plus internationally.

And who would manage the J/K/L’s? There’s only one candidate I believe, John Lyall.

That Was The Week That Was (Extra)

A special supplement looking at events in September 1998.

This Week Hammers History Geoff writes some excellent features that look back on specific weeks in West Ham history. I hope he doesn’t mind if I add to this week’s article which was posted on September 26, as I have personal memories of the long weekend (in football terms) that stretched from Thursday 24 September to Monday 28 September in 1998. That is eighteen years ago. So anybody born in that week is now able to do various things legally that they weren’t supposed to beforehand. And I personally know somebody who had their 45th birthday on September 27 that year, and who therefore celebrates their 63rd this week. Happy birthday Mr. H.

The weekend in question is what might be termed Premier League Matchday 7 nowadays, although I don’t think the phrase existed at the time. So every team had played 7 games at the end of the weekend, except for Manchester United and Chelsea who had only played six for reasons that I cannot recall.

Manchester United beat Liverpool 2-0 in the Thursday game in front of the weekend’s biggest attendance of just over 55,000. Aston Villa beat Derby 1-0 to open up a five point lead at the top of the table with five wins and two draws in their seven games. Incredibly (for a team well on top) they had only scored eight goals and conceded just one. This was the first defeat of the season for Derby, who were in second place, and they too had very few goals in their games, with just six scored and three conceded.

There were far fewer goals scored at the beginning of the 1998-99 season compared to today. 153 goals had been scored in 69 matches. This season there have been 176 goals in just 60 games. Only one of the ten games that weekend produced more than 2 goals (a 3-3 draw between Tottenham and Leeds). This year, last weekend had 7 matches where three or more goals were scored.

Aston Villa were top, Derby were second and Wimbledon third, (with West Ham fourth). Other Premier League teams included Newcastle, Leeds, Sheffield Wednesday, Charlton, Forest, Coventry and Blackburn. 50% of the teams in the league 18 years ago are no longer in the top flight. To further illustrate the changing nature of teams at the top, five of those teams who are not currently in the Premier League have been champions in the top flight of English football in the last forty-five years.

Di Canio I remember the weekend for two particular reasons. Firstly, I was at Upton Park for our game which featured as the Sky Monday night football. Just over 23,000 were there to witness us beating Southampton (who were rooted to the bottom with just one point at the time) by 1-0, with an Ian Wright goal in the second half. Compare that to the attendance for our game against Southampton on Sunday!

But the most remembered aspect of that weekend was in the game at Hillsborough where Sheffield Wednesday beat Arsenal 1-0 with a late goal. A certain Mr. Di Canio got in an angry exchange with both Patrick Vieira and Martin Keown. The referee, Paul Alcock, sent off Di Canio, who was so angry he pushed the official, who then fell theatrically to the ground. The red card (and of course the push) led to Di Canio receiving an eleven match ban. This was effectively the end of his time at Wednesday, and early in 1999 Harry Redknapp took what many considered to be a massive gamble, and brought Di Canio to Upton Park. In the four years he spent with us he became an Upton Park legend.

And how did the season end? Southampton, who were five points adrift of safety when we beat them, avoided relegation. Perhaps our situation is not as critical as the doom-mongers amongst our fans would have you believe after our poor start this season? Villa did not hang on to their big early season lead and finished in sixth place, 24 points adrift of Manchester United, the champions. Derby fell to eighth, and Wimbledon fell dramatically from third after seven games, to finish fifth from bottom.

We had what still remains as our best ever Premier League season finishing in fifth place. Not quite as impressive as our 1985-86 third place in the top flight, but our best ever finish since the inception of the Premier League which has been going for around 25 years now. As a result we qualified for the Intertoto cup, and our success in that meant we went on to the UEFA Cup where we were eliminated by Steaua Bucharest of Romania. What is it about Romanian teams?

Incredibly for a team finishing in fifth place, Ian Wright was our leading scorer for the season with just nine goals. Following the end of the season he never played another league game for us again, going out on loan to Forest and then finishing his career at Celtic and Burnley.

But it was the events at Sheffield Wednesday that weekend that were to have a significant impact on the history of West Ham, especially for the following four years.

Don’t Panic! (How Could We Possibly Recover From That?)

More difficulty starting than an Austin Allegro!

West Ham 1970s Following on from my “Don’t Press the Panic Button” article, for any readers that are younger then me (and most will be), I thought I would relate my “beginning of each season” experiences as a young supporter of West Ham in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Traditionally, of course, we have always had a reputation for performing badly in the second half of the season (down with the Christmas decorations?), but how did we fare in our opening games?

I’ll start with the 1965-66 season. I was eleven years old and had been at Wembley when we had just won the European Cup Winners Cup in May, after winning the FA Cup the season before that. Hopes were high that we would push on in the league. So what happened? We won just one game out of the first eight (a 2-1 victory over Leeds who were to finish runners-up at the end of the season). Five of those games were lost, including three consecutive games (two of them at home!) in one nightmare week where we conceded five goals in each of them (15 in total!). How could we possibly recover from that?

I’ll move on to the following season, 1966-67. England had just won the World Cup and, as we all know, West Ham were very instrumental in that. Hopes were high once again. So what happened? This time we won just one of our opening seven games, including defeats in the first three. How could we possibly recover from that?

The next season, 1967-68, we won just one of our first six games, conceding 18 goals in the process. Four of the games were lost. How could we possibly recover from that?

Let’s move on to 1969-70. We won our first two games to go top of the league, and then didn’t win any of the next seven, including five defeats, to plummet almost to the bottom. How could we possibly recover from that?

The following season (1970-71) we were at it again. This time we didn’t win any of our first ten league games. That’s right, ten games, no wins! How could we possibly recover from that?

Moving on to the following season (1971-72) we lost our first three games and drew the fourth 0-0. One point, bottom of the league, and not a single goal scored. How could we possibly recover from that?

By 1972-73 we were improving very slightly in our early season performances. This time we incredibly managed to win two of our opening seven league games, which included three consecutive defeats. How could we possibly recover from that?

But by the following year (1973-74) we were back to our old opening form. We didn’t manage to win a single match out of the first eleven league games played, drawing four and losing seven. We were bottom of the league at this point. How could we possibly recover from that?

And finally 1974-75, the season that ended with us winning the FA Cup. We won just one of our opening seven league games, and at this stage once again sat rock bottom of the league. How could we possibly recover from that?

The observant readers among you will have noticed that I missed a season out. Nine seasons out of ten we had dreadful starts. But one year was an exception. In 1968-69 we only lost one of our first eleven league games and were challenging at the very top.

So there you are, ten consecutive seasons taking me from age 11 through to age 21. In nine of the ten our start was equivalent to what we’ve seen this year. So which of the ten seasons do you think we finished highest in the league? Just looking at the bare facts you would probably opt for 1968-69. But you’d be wrong. In 1972-73 we finished in sixth place. And for all those poor starts, how many times did we get relegated in those ten seasons. That’s right, we didn’t. Not once!

And what about all the excuses that are being put forward for our poor start to this season? Did they apply then? Time and time again I keep hearing the same thing. Our poor start wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t moved to a new stadium. Well as you know, throughout those ten seasons we played at Upton Park. Fans citing that as an excuse for our poor start this year need to remember that Upton Park was not always the intimidating fortress that they remember.

Yes, our start is disappointing, especially after all the optimism following last season. Perhaps we set our expectations too high? The performances have been poor though. Throughout the years that I covered above we had players of the calibre of Moore, Hurst, Peters, Brooking, Bonds, Byrne, Boyce, Lampard, and Pop Robson. And we played at Upton Park! But we still had some appalling starts to seasons and recovered.

“Don’t Panic” is a Coldplay song. “Don’t Panic” is a famous phrase from The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. “Don’t panic” is one of Lance Corporal Jones’ famous catchphrases from Dads Army. “Don’t panic” is my message. We’ve been there so many times before. I could be wrong but give it a bit longer. I’m confident we’ll be OK.

West Ham 0 v 3 Southampton

Don’t Press The Panic Button

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Let me start by saying that I am massively disappointed with our poor showing in the first few games of this season. After the great promise of Slaven Bilic’s first year in charge when we came tantalisingly close to finishing in a Champions League qualifying position, it appears to have all gone pear-shaped. So why has it happened?

Firstly, we are defending very poorly and at the back we appear to have lost confidence. But don’t believe that this is a new thing. In thirteen of our last sixteen Premier League games (that is the six of this, and the final ten of last season) we conceded two or more goals. That is not a good record. For me, the manager can’t seem to pick a right back. Yesterday we had Arbeloa filling in at left back and Byram was not selected. Instead he preferred a defensive midfielder in that position. The game was fairly even until we conceded the first goal, inevitably via the right back position, and of course inevitably scored by Charlie Austin. Didn’t you just know that would happen?

Reid and Ogbonna are international defenders but I don’t believe that they make a good pairing. Both to me are old-fashioned number sixes that play better alongside a commanding number five, like Oxford for example? Like Bobby Moore playing alongside Jack Charlton, or even Tommy Taylor.

And the loss of Cresswell has proved more important than many believed it would. Kouyate seems a shadow of the player we saw last season, Noble just isn’t doing it, and Lanzini isn’t yet up to speed. Payet still seems to be suffering a hangover from the Euros, and his body language didn’t look good; it was almost as if he wanted to be elsewhere. Zaza did more running off the ball than people give him credit for, but does not look like an international forward on the evidence so far. Antonio cannot be expected to carry the team on his own and the look on his face when he was moved to right back was priceless.

If it was my team then I’d be looking for more youthful energy and pace. Based on the current fit players then I would play Byram at right back, Reid and Oxford in the middle, and Ogbonna at left back. I would have Obiang as a defensive midfielder with Fernandes and Kouyate in midfield. Can nobody else see the promise, pace and energy in Fernandes in just the few minutes he has been given? Up front I’d have Antonio and Payet wide, and persevere with Zaza for the time being. Apart from left back it would be all players playing in their natural positions, and even Ogbonna does have experience in the left back berth.

My bench would be selected from Arbeloa to cover either of the full back berths, Collins for the central positions, Nordtveit as cover for Obiang, Lanzini, Noble and Feghouli for the midfield positions and Fletcher up front. I’d also be hoping for the quick return to fitness of Cresswell, Ayew and Carroll which would enable greater choice.

Southampton have received a lot of plaudits for their performance, and yes, they deserved to win. But until they scored it was an even game. The worrying thing was how our heads appeared to drop once we were behind. A lot of confidence has gone in a defending sense, in fact it is at rock bottom, and we lack creativity. We don’t look like we have a plan as to how we are going to score goals.

I wonder if there are other behind-the-scenes issues? Are there problems off the pitch that we are not aware of? Are there perhaps cliques developing? That is my suspicion after seeing the body language, especially when goals are conceded. When things are going wrong players need to stand together. We need to win together and lose together. But we are losing as individuals. The support can’t even seem to stick together. It was great until the second goal went in. But after that the stadium emptied at a faster rate than ever before.

Slaven Bilic described our situation in his press conference as “the Perfect Storm”. The move to a new stadium? Rubbish – I’ve seen plenty of poor performances at Upton Park. The injuries? We’ve had injuries before. Thirteen new players? Poor summer recruitment? We’ve improved the squad but not the team? Perhaps this is true – we’ve bought a lot of second hand Mondeos when we needed a couple of Rolls Royces or Bentleys. Bad luck? Last season’s performances over-hyped? Poor defending?

We’ve got to stop making excuses. We have players of sufficient quality to be at least a mid-table team. I’ve described how I would tinker with the team but I’m not in charge. Bilic has to prove his managerial qualities now. The players must get together, stick together, and play as a team. We have only played six games. There is no need to press the panic button yet. We’ve been in this position before. Let’s see where we are at the end of October when four more league games have been played.