Richard Bennett

Report: Manchester City 3 V 1 West Ham

Disappointment in the Taxpayer Funded Stadium Derby

mcfc v whufc We all think we are experts at selecting the West Ham team that should play in any particular match. A quick look at social media would tell you why selection by committee doesn’t work. It has been tried for various sports teams and has rarely been successful. We have to trust the appointed person, in our case Slaven Bilic, to make his selections based upon a much more intimate knowledge of the personnel under consideration than we will ever have. We also have to trust that he and his staff have worked upon formations and systems and styles of play appropriate to the game about to be played. I would always trust Super Slav ahead of the current England manager, for example.

However, prior to today’s game, upon seeing our team and formation, and in anticipation of writing this article, I made the following notes.

Disappointed to see us trying a 3-5-2 formation today with three centre backs. I think Slav has got this horribly wrong – I just hope he proves it to be a tactical masterstroke, but I fear not.
The formation and selection mean that Antonio will once again be wasted at right wing back, which against a team of the attacking calibre of City will effectively mean he is playing at right back again!
If Lanzini is fit enough to be on the bench then why not start him? We desperately need his creative flair, and even if he doesn’t last a full game, better to have a go from the start rather than waiting until we have potentially fallen behind.
Disappointed to see Byram only on the bench. This lad could be our right back for years to come. OK, he made a mistake in the Astra game. He looks the type to learn from it. I would have liked to have seen a back four of Byram, Masuaku (who looks to have fitted in well), and two of our centre backs, either Collins and Reid or Collins and Ogbonna. I am always concerned by the Reid / Ogbonna partnership. I don’t think it works.
With Nordveidt out, I would have loved to see Obiang in the side (who I prefer anyway) or Oxford as a defensive midfielder. Has Slav ever played Oxford again as a defensive midfielder since the opening game of last season when he kept the Arsenal midfield in his pocket?
Valencia = blind alleys = total waste of time. Has he scored since we drew with City at Upton Park in January?
Tore = I’m not convinced yet.
My back four has been selected in number 4 above. In front of them I would have Obiang or Oxford as defensive midfield, Noble and Kouyate, Lanzini and Antonio, with Fletcher leading the line.

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Preview: West Ham v Manchester City

I Have a Dream! West Ham make the trip north to face Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium.

West Ham at Man City I had a strange dream last night. No, not that kind of dream! I was appearing on a quiz show and was just being asked the £1 million question. The quiz show itself was a mixture of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, A Question of Sport, Mastermind and Deal or No Deal. One minute I was facing Chris Tarrant, then Sue Barker, then Magnus Magnusson and then Noel Edmonds. I was sitting on a chair in front of an audience, then I was part of a team with Phil Tufnell, then I was on a black chair in darkness, and finally Noel Edmonds was asking me the question, Deal or No Deal, only to be interrupted by a telephone call from the banker, who then wanted to make me another offer.

The question I was being asked was “What Happened Next?” Four football matches were being described to me and I had to select the correct answer to win the money. In the first game West Ham were playing Manchester City and were winning the game 4-1, then in the second game West Ham were again playing City and once again were leading 4-1. In the third game I had the same situation, West Ham were beating Manchester City 4-1 close to the end of the game. And yes you’ve guessed it, the fourth game was exactly the same, we were beating them 4-1.

I was confused. I kept telling them there were four different answers. Chris Tarrant wanted to know if I wanted to phone a friend, Magnus said he’d started so he’d finish, Matt Dawson was in fits of laughter, Jeremy Paxman was telling me I’d have to hurry (how did University Challenge get in?), Noel Edmonds wanted to know if I wanted to swap my box, and the phone was ringing. I told them there were different occasions when we were beating City 4-1, how could I know what one they were referring to? Thankfully, at that point I woke up in a sweat. Yes, it has been very warm at night lately.

I can only blame myself. I was thinking about this week’s game at the Etihad and before going to bed I was looking back on previous memorable encounters with City that I remember well. There was the game at Maine Road in 1970 at Maine Road when Jimmy Greaves made his debut for us and scored twice, Ronnie Boyce scored from the half way line and we won the game 5-1, to gain our revenge on a 4-0 home defeat to them just three months earlier.

Then there was a game at Upton Park about twelve years later when Sandy Clark scored a brace (don’t you just love that phrase) in a 4-1 win. Then in 1996 Iain Dowie scored a couple of goals as we thrashed them 4-2, again at Upton Park, with Niall Quinn scoring City’s second as the referee blew the final whistle. Lastly in November 2000, we recovered from a half-time 1-0 deficit, with goals from Steve Lomas, Stuart Pearce, Trevor Sinclair (all three of whom ironically have a City connection) and finally a penalty from Paolo in the last minute to record another 4-1 victory.

So what will happen on Sunday? We have a mounting injury crisis which shows little sign of ending. Last September when we surprisingly won the away game 2-1 we had the following starting line-up: Adrian, Jenkinson, Tomkins, Reid, Cresswell, Noble, Obiang, Lanzini, Payet, Moses and Sakho. The goals were scored by Moses and Sakho. Antonio, Jelavic and Collins were second half substitutes. It was one of our famous away victories in the last campaign. How times change. How many of that starting line-up will begin Sunday’s game?

When the return fixture was played at Upton Park in January, Valencia scored twice in a 2-2 draw, making it four goals that he scored in under a fortnight. How many goals has he scored since that game?

In my lifetime I can only ever recall one goalless draw in an away league game at City (in 1994) and I don’t expect another this weekend. I have a feeling that the score may be 4-1, and that we will be on the losing end. I hope not, but our performances to date have not been encouraging. But even if we do lose the game we will still be on three points, exactly the same tally as we had after three games last season. And this time, two of the season’s toughest away games will have been played, whereas last season two of our first three games were at home.

Despite Thursday’s poor show, it’s not all doom and gloom. We can dream that it will get better. And congratulations to Adrian on his first call up to the Spanish squad. Perhaps he can keep a clean sheet to celebrate?

I Wouldn’t Bet On It 5

Let’s Try An Acca (with money back guarantee).

Fancy A Bet Last week I was massively confident of a victory over Bournemouth and staked 10 points on a West Ham win at 21/20 (20.5). Antonio’s late goal saved us when it was beginning to look like we might lose out. So this brought our balance up to 100.6, giving us a small profit on the season to date.

Today we’ll try an accumulator bet, where if one of our selections is wrong we get the money back as a free bet, as offered by some bookmakers.

The selections are:

Everton to beat Stoke 8/11

Southampton to beat Sunderland 8/13

Bradford to beat Oldham 4/5

Accrington to beat Morecambe 19/20

Doncaster to beat Yeovil 4/6

I’ll put 1 point on the accumulator which gives odds of 15.3/1.

I’ll also try to select the result of three other games:

1 point on West Brom to draw with Middlesbrough @21/10 (3.1)

1 point on Brentford to draw with Sheffield Wednesday @21/10 (3.1)

1 point on Bristol City to draw with Aston Villa at 21/10 (3.1)

1 point on a treble of the above three matches at 28.8/1 (29.8)

Total spend is 5 points bringing our balance down to 95.6.

The Lawro Challenge Week 3

We continue to do battle with the thatch headed one.

Lawro Crystal Ball Lawro may be “steamrollering” his invited guests, band members, comedians etc. (none of whom seem to be particularly skilled in the art of predicting football matches) in the first two weeks of the season but he’s not having his own way against us. This week on the BBC website he faces Laura Trott, the well-known football tipster.

Early days of course, but last week’s scores were Rich 8, Lawro 8, and Geoff 5.

This makes the cumulative totals after two weeks, Rich 17, Lawro 14, Geoff 13.

This week’s Lawro:-

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

West Ham 0 v 1 Astra Giurgiu

Just Not Good Enough! When you set out for a walk in the park and end up flat on your face.

Angry Slaven Bilic As Super Slav sat down to select his team and squad to face Romanian champions Astra Giurgiu, he was fully aware of the delicate balancing act needed to win the game and hence qualify for the Europa League group stage, whilst at the same time not compromising his team selection for the difficult away Premier League game at Manchester City on Sunday. He was unable to do this last season but now had a much stronger squad to pick from despite the injuries and unavailable players. Or so we thought. He stated this was his strongest possible team. Captain Mark Noble had a slight knock and was not risked. It was disappointing to see Randolf displayed on the scoreboard instead of Randolph. It was even more disappointing to see Bilic start with just one forward in a home game against a team as poor as this.

On eight minutes Calleri, following a superb through ball from Burke, found himself one on one with the keeper and should have scored, but just like the last minute of the Bournemouth game, failed to do so. Full backs Byram and Burke caught the eye early on, and a superb strike from Obiang on 14 minutes came close to breaking the deadlock. But we weren’t showing enough urgency. We were moving the ball too slowly. Surely we weren’t playing for a 0-0 draw?

The German referee tried to keep the game flowing when Romanians were committing fouls, but seemed to be pulling us up regularly. Half time had almost arrived when the 35 year old ex-West Brom player Teixeira finished off a slick move reminiscent of one of the Juventus goals a couple of weeks back. Unfortunately the Astra counter attack was created by Byram and Burke perhaps revealing their inexperience. Oh how we longed for the creativity of a Payet, Lanzini, or Feghouli to come off the bench in the second half, but of course none of them were available.

Astra had only kept one clean sheet in twelve previous away games in Europe and that was in Scotland at Inverness. Surely it was only a matter of time before we equalised? We raised the tempo early in the second half and Calleri missed a header that Sandra Redknapp would have scored. Fletcher, who was one of the only players who could be happy with his performance, could have had a penalty, and should have scored from six yards but aimed straight at the keeper. But he was only the second choice attacking substitute and had barely half an hour to make his mark.

Valencia had come on at half time, but apart from one half decent free kick, just did his usual running down blind alleys. Antonio missed a header, albeit not as easy as you might think, from about four yards out. We continued to press forward, but a long time before the end of the game you just knew we weren’t going to score. And we didn’t. In some ways it was reminiscent of watching England play Poland in 1973. Just as then we thought we only had to turn up to win.

The German referee fell for all the Astra spoiling tactics and had a shocking game. But so did so many of our team who just weren’t good enough. If you could have seen that coming you could have made a lot of money. Astra were 8/1 with the bookies at the start. Some West Ham fans were fighting each other. The stewards let them get on with it. The crowd were getting very hostile. If only we’d seen more fight from the players, especially in the first half. According to reports Simone Zaza is expected to sign for us on Friday. I wonder if he was watching tonight?

Stand Up If You Love West Ham?

Could this become the biggest controversy at West Ham since the Bond Scheme?

Standing at Olympic Stadium My first visit to Upton Park was in 1958. I was four years old. I sat in the stand. B Block in the old West Stand to be precise. When I was old enough to go with friends we always stood. The North Bank was our position of choice for many years. I stood when over 42,000 crammed into the ground against Tottenham one day. We could barely move. But we were young and we didn’t care. It was more fun to watch a game whilst standing on the terraces. It was all we could afford anyway.

But in 1989 a disaster in Sheffield led to a review of the law relating to safety certificates being issued at football stadiums. They became all-seater at Premier League grounds more than twenty years ago, and despite many people wanting safe standing areas, they remain so. Many would welcome these areas but it would require legal changes for it to happen. Just because unofficial standing areas became the norm at Upton Park, usually in the lower areas, and a blind eye appeared to be turned, it doesn’t mean that it is a right now that we have moved into a new stadium. Many who don’t wish to stand (or in fact cannot stand) are inconvenienced because of their position in the ground.

At Upton Park fans knew where the unofficial standing areas were and migrated to them accordingly if they wished to stand. Moving to a new stadium has meant that these unofficial areas have not yet been established and this has therefore exacerbated the issue.

We could have had 60,000 for the visit of Bournemouth. But this had to be reduced to 57,000 as we couldn’t get a safety certificate for the higher figure. Who is to say that this won’t get reduced further if the standing persists? With 52,000 season ticket holders and tickets for away fans then this only left around 2,000 tickets available for people who are unable to get a season ticket. And we are told there are thousands on the waiting list. The club would like to increase the capacity to 66,000 to accommodate the demand, but this looks increasingly unlikely whilst some supporters continue to defy the rules because they believe it is their right to stand.

Now I prefer to sit to watch football. I am not one of the new breed of supporters (Essex middle class was the term used by one standing fan). I have been a regular for nearly 60 years and I have reached an age where a day out to watch football involves a lot of standing and walking, and I prefer to watch the game in relative comfort sitting down. I join in with Bubbles, and I shout and scream as the game is on. I leap to my feet when a goal is scored. When I get home I have often got a very hoarse voice. I am as passionate about West Ham as I was in the sixties, seventies and eighties when I stood on the North Bank. But I don’t have to stand up to show my passion.

The new stadium is infinitely more comfortable than Upton Park. I am lucky in that I sit in an upper tier where others are also seated. As I looked down at the Bournemouth game I could see the problems and conflict arising. Many stood in defiance because they believe it is their right. Throughout the game many faced away from the game with their arms aloft and started the chant “Stand up if you love West Ham”. I love West Ham but I don’t have to stand to prove it. This was followed frequently with “We’re West Ham United, we stand if we want.” These fans are not concerned about the consequences of their actions. They don’t seem to care if they mar the enjoyment of others. They don’t care that fewer can get tickets.

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West Ham v Astra Giurgiu Preview

Our gateway to the league group stage of the Europa League?

west ham v astra 2015 For the second time in a week and the fourth time in a year we are playing Astra Giurgiu of Romania. This time it is for a place in the group stage of the Europa League which will mean an additional six Thursday games between now and the end of the year if we overcome them successfully. Will we be able to cope if we get through?

Last Thursday we drew 1-1 in Romania. The result should have been so much better. Shortly before the Astra equaliser we missed a really good opportunity to extend our lead to 2-0 which would have put us in a very strong position for the second leg. But it was not to be so we go into this game all square with an away goal.

We were not particularly impressive in our opening Premier League game on Sunday but nevertheless we claimed three points with Antonio’s late goal. It is still early in the season and we have many first choice players unavailable at the moment so let’s not get too disheartened. Some people on social media are really depressed about the way we have started but there is a long way to go this season. And if you compare the same games with last season (when we lost at home to Bournemouth and drew away at Chelsea) then we are already two points better off!

Astra Giurgiu may be the Romanian champions but they are in disarray as a club. They have numerous off field problems which are well documented, and their league performances are going from bad to worse. Before we played them last week they sat in ninth place in their domestic league. At the weekend they took a 5-1 hammering at CFR Cluj and have now sunk into eleventh place. They would be even lower if it wasn’t for teams close to the bottom (including CFR Cluj) who have had points deducted this season for “irregularities”.

So this game should be straightforward, shouldn’t it? If we put out a half decent team (and Slav has confirmed that we are taking this competition seriously) then there is no reason why we shouldn’t progress comfortably into the group stage. Scoring seems to be our problem but hopefully we will have some of our creative players back (Dimi and Manu?) and open up their defence at will. An early goal or two would be good – I am hoping for a 3-0 win at least.

The group stage draw takes place in Monaco on Friday with the first two Europa league games scheduled for 15^th and 29^th September, which are prior to our weekend games away at West Brom and then home to Middlesbrough. The next two European games are scheduled for 20^th October and 3^rd November, prior to the Premier League games at home to Sunderland and Stoke. So if we get through this match, and you prefer your Saturday games, you should savour our home game against Watford on Saturday 10^th September which kicks off at 3pm. Because if we beat Astra, the Watford game will be our only Saturday game in the first half of the season until at least December! I hope you are free on Sundays!

Spotlight on the Officials

A quick look at some of the decisions made by the referees this weekend.

Refereeing Traditionally it has always been said that if you don’t notice a referee in a game of football then he’s had a good game. To some extent this is true. Referees and their assistants do have assessors in the stands at every game feeding back on their performance so in theory their decisions (or non-decisions) are scrutinised carefully. But if a referee doesn’t get a mention in a newspaper or media report on a game then he should normally be pleased. Although some do court the attention and believe they are on a par with the players in providing the entertainment.

All officials will continue to make mistakes (as we all do in life), and until some form of video technology is introduced then these errors will continue to be highlighted, and can have a significant outcome on the results of games. The concept of using video referees in the stands is something that is gaining momentum, and something I am wholly in favour of. The technology is there, although we have to be careful how it is used. I will expand upon how it can be introduced at a later date, but I believe it is urgently needed to minimise the errors made by the officials. I have heard that generally they are in favour themselves and would welcome the help it would give them. In the meantime I have noted a few issues that have come up even at this early stage of the season.

Last weekend Jon Moss took charge of the Watford v Chelsea game. Apart from missing one of the most blatant handballs you will ever see when Cathcart handled from a corner, Moss also failed to send off Costa for simulation (diving to most of us) after he had booked him for dissent earlier in the game. This meant he was still on the field when he shouldn’t have been to score the winning goal late in the game. Ring any bells? Oh yes Anthony Taylor failed to send him off for his disgraceful challenge on Adrian, after he had previously booked him for dissent just a few days earlier. The result of all this? Chelsea have got six points this season after two games when some might argue they should only have two. Those points might be very important in the final analysis. I remember Mr. Moss well for what I believe were important decisions against us at Leicester last season and at Tottenham the season before. 95^th minute penalties if I recall correctly?

“Perhaps the first on Drinkwater was debatable, but the second was cast-iron, stonewall, nailed-on, or whatever you would like to call it.”

Tony Pulis’ teams have I believe, got away with American Football style blocking in the penalty area at set pieces for some years. Perhaps they aren’t the only ones, but Stoke always stood out for me in this respect, and latterly West Brom are the same. Last weekend from a corner, Berahinho was detailed to “look after” the Everton keeper (Stekelenburg?) and backed him into the net as a corner came across allowing McAuley a free header to score. Not the first time the Albion have used this ploy. It was so obvious to see on TV but did Mr. Swarbrick see it? Apparently not.

I’ve always thought that Mark Clattenburg reminded me of somebody but I didn’t realise who until I saw him shake hands with Koscielny of Arsenal at the end of the game at Leicester. Last season Leicester were awarded a scandalous number of penalties and followed this up with one in their first game of the season at Hull. But I wonder if Mr. Clattenburg has cottoned on to this, as he denied them two fairly clear-cut spot kick awards in the game against the Gunners. Perhaps the first on Drinkwater was debatable, but the second was cast-iron, stonewall, nailed-on, or whatever you would like to call it. He was possibly the only person who saw it who didn’t think so. Perhaps he is single-handedly giving Leicester their comeuppance for some “dubious” penalty awards in the past year.

Well done to Mike Dean who appears to have started a one-man crusade against holding in the penalty area at corners. He awarded two penalties for this infringement in the Stoke v Man. City game and is to be congratulated in his stance to try to eradicate this nonsense from the game. But he doesn’t appear to have been backed up by referees elsewhere even though it was an issue they were going to tackle this season. Unless this is applied consistently then it will continue to spoil games. It will be interesting to see if Mr. Dean keeps it up, or if he gets criticised by the assessors for this.

My award for referee of the week goes to Craig Pawson who refereed our game v Bournemouth. I have been critical of him in the past (Arsenal last season) but felt he was spot on throughout the game and got most decisions right. He tried to let the game flow, but stopped it when he had to. He certainly made fewer mistakes than many of the players on view.

All change: Trains, missing seats and standing orders!

Travel difficulties and the matchday stadium experience.

Rail Map We set out from Bury St Edmunds at noon looking forward the third opening game at the London Stadium. The Domzale game was the first, Juventus came next, and now the first home league game. We drove to Epping, parked the car, and boarded the westbound Central Line train at around 1.15 anticipating arrival in Stratford 30 minutes later.

Within minutes we knew this would not be the case. A message (from the driver) informed us that the train would be going no further than Leytonstone due to an incident at Mile End. No problem, no doubt we can get a bus from there we thought. The train reached Loughton at 1.30 and we all had to get off; it was going no further. And no trains would be going beyond Loughton until further notice as there was a person on the track at Mile End.

We milled around on the platform and discussed the problem with fellow supporters who we didn’t know, who became known to us as Paul and his son, Owen, and Rich. After a short conversation Paul said his car was parked close to Loughton Station so we could drive to a nearby overground station. Five of us set off in his car without a destination in mind as we drove away, and used mobiles and google to try to work out the best route to Stratford.

Google and tfl suggested Chingford to Hackney Downs, walk to Hackney Central and then train to Stratford. Parking was easy in Chingford on a Sunday, train connections arrived with no delays and the walk in Hackney was via a footbridge which apparently reduced the walk from 600 metres to 200 metres. We were there in plenty of time for the game.

The atmosphere beforehand was good, Bubbles was loud, and we settled down for what turned out to be a dull, uneventful game. Geoff’s article “Five Things We Learned From This Week’s West Ham Game” tells you all you need to know about the game itself.

Stand up The stadium still has some teething problems. There was the continued issue of those who wish to watch the game whilst standing. The club had to reduce the capacity to 57,000 for safety reasons because of the refusal of a number, mainly in the lower tiers, who insisted on not using the seats provided for them. I can understand their frustration as in my younger days I preferred to stand at football games and did so for many years. I can also see the other side of the issue – people who wanted to sit but who were in seats behind those who were standing. “We’re West Ham United, we’ll stand if we want” those on their feet sang, some of whom didn’t appear to be taking much notice of the game itself.

The stewards moved in en masse and tried to reason with the standing supporters but no luck, they weren’t sitting for anyone. On my journey home I read social media where some of those standing were boasting of how they had seen off the stewards and got their own way. I also read others who had written that the stewards were mainly just taking seat numbers. They went on to say that, if the club were true to their word and wanted to eradicate the standing, and hence get a safety certificate to increase the potential crowd numbers, they would be writing to the “transgressors”. It would be a warning to them that if they refused to follow instructions then their season tickets would be withdrawn, and they would effectively be banned. Some were apparently ejected from the ground during the game, although I don’t know how many. The row continues on social media, and will no doubt still be an issue on Thursday.

56 people who had bought seats found that there were no seats for them to sit on – an administrative error I heard. They sat on the concrete or stood I suppose? The club apologised and said the seats would be there on Thursday.

Apparently the attendance was 56,977 leaving just 23 unfilled seats. There were many more than 23 with no occupants so these must have been the 3,000 that were reduced from the original expected 60,000. The club had obviously spread these around the stadium but some news reports were mischievously (I thought) trying to emphasise supporters not turning up. Perhaps the Mile End incident was another factor?

I was interested in the figure of 23 short of a whole thousand. On seven different occasions last season the official attendance at our home games was recorded as exactly 34,977, 23 short of 35,000. Incredible coincidence don’t you think?

I Wouldn’t Bet On It 4

The latest instalment of our regular betting for fun column.

Fancy A Bet Before embarking on this week’s column I will recap on the last bet where I placed 1 point on there being exactly 3 goals in the Chelsea v West Ham game last Monday. This fun bet was correct, although I would have preferred that we scored the late goal, not Costa, who I don’t believe should have still been on the field anyway. This brought our balance up to 95.1.

This week I will be concentrating solely on our game against Bournemouth today. Just looking at the Paddy Power website (many other bookmakers are available on-line) there are 138 different markets that you can bet on in this one game of football! But before looking at a selection of the possible bets I’ll look back on the results of the seven Premier League games played yesterday.

Of the three possible results in a game of football, home, away or draw, the favourite result came up four times (wins for Man. City, Tottenham, Chelsea and Everton), whereas the least favourite result was the outcome in the other three (wins for Burnley and Hull, and Leicester drawing with Arsenal). The second favourite result didn’t happen in any of the games.

“I’m massively confident of a victory today so I’ll stake 10 points on a West Ham win at 21/20 (20.5).”

A one point bet on each of the 7 favourite results would have resulted in an overall loss of about half of your total stake despite getting 4 of the 7 correct. A one point bet on each of the second favourite results would have meant a total loss of all your stake money. A one point bet on each of the 7 least fancied results would have resulted in almost doubling your money despite only getting 3 correct results. So on Saturday your best bet was to go for the least predictable results unless you were clever enough to mix and match and correctly predict all seven (very unlikely!).

The point being made is that correctly predicting the outcome of football matches is extremely difficult. That’s why I bet for fun only with modest stakes. I generally do better on horse racing bets and my modest bet yesterday was a fiver on Heartbreak City in the Ebor at York at 12-1. So I had a smile on my face yesterday afternoon, but with just £5 staked it wouldn’t have been heartbreak if I had lost.

So what fun bets will I be making on today’s game? The odds setters at Paddy Power haven’t done their homework properly because there are some stupid / hilarious odds on offer for the first goal scorer in the match. Some selected odds are: Sakho, favourite at 5/1, Ayew and Emenike available at 11/2, Lanzini at 15/2, Diego Poyet at 16/1, Song and Cresswell at 25/1, and you can even bet on Jenkinson or Joey O’Brien at 40/1. I think I’ll steer clear of all those! What nonsense and very poor from Paddy Power to not bring their database up to date.

I’m massively confident of a victory today so I’ll stake 10 points on a West Ham win at 21/20 (20.5). With those odds the bookmakers believe there is a less than 50% chance of us winning but I believe our chances are better than that and therefore think that offers me good value.

Then for pure fun I’ll stake the following:

1 point on West Ham to win and both teams to score at 13/5 (3.6)

1 point on West Ham to score 3 or more goals in the game at 11/4 (3.7)

1 point on West Ham to win 3-1 at 14/1 (15)

1 point on Mark Noble to score the first goal and West Ham to win 3-1 at 100/1 (101)

1 point on West Ham to win and Mark Noble to score anytime at 7/1 (8).

The figures in brackets relate to the return if the bet is successful.

If we win the game then I’ll be in profit just from the win bet alone, even if all the others lose. The five fun bets will give me additional interest when watching the game even though the chances of them winning are less likely. If we don’t win the game then I’ll lose all 15 points staked. But my stakes will be low so it won’t bother me at all. My biggest disappointment will be the fact that we haven’t won the game or collected the three points on offer in a game that I believe we should win.

I start on 95.1 points so the 15 points staked will reduce my balance to 80.1. Not particularly sensible betting perhaps but fun all the same.