Under The Hammers

I watched a game of football on Monday night. I actually quite enjoyed it. I thought we did OK. I wouldn’t say any better than OK, but we were certainly better than how we performed at home against Manchester City and Arsenal in recent times. Once again the match emphasised to me the gulf in class between the top sides and mid-table ones like ourselves. Chelsea were undoubtedly superior to us in defence, in midfield, and going forward. But that is not to say that with our limited capabilities we didn’t give it a go. I thought we tried hard. But they are so organised that with our lack of pace and guile when attacking it was always going to be difficult to break them down.

I have written before on many occasions that I am not a fan of statistics so I really shouldn’t start using them now to emphasise a point. But I will. We had more of the ball than our opponents and more shots than they did. But it is what you do with the ball that counts, and how good your shots are. I am amazed that highly paid professional footballers can fail to hit the target as much as they do when shooting at goal. I was only a Sunday league player myself but my dad taught me something very important when I was very young. It helped me to score quite a few goals at the level I played at. It was simple. If your shot is not on target then you won’t score. How many times do our players shoot wildly over the bar or wide of the target?

I even saw some statistics today that purported to show that Noble had a better game in midfield than Kante did. I did laugh. Much as I love Noble and his commitment to our club, I know who I would prefer in our midfield. Apparently one of the pieces of data showed that Noble found a team mate with 95% of his passes compared to Kante’s 90%. There was other data which the writer used to show that Noble won the midfield battle on the night. I didn’t see the data that showed how many of Noble’s passes went sideways or backwards though.

Now would someone please answer this question for me. We have a free-kick central to the goal about 25 yards out, and it is obvious we are going to have a shot at goal. Yes that makes sense. Occasionally they go in. More than occasionally if your name is Payet, or even Snodgrass playing for Hull. But Lanzini takes the kick, it hits the wall, and we have secondary possession. Most of our defence has been thrown forward, which I don’t fully understand if we are going to have a shot as opposed to trying to put the ball in the air. Now with all of our tall defenders plus Carroll in an attacking position, Noble has the opportunity to put the ball into the box. But no. Some dilly-dallying and a few seconds later Chelsea have broken at speed and we are one down. Has anyone not watched Chelsea play this season? Wouldn’t it have been prudent to have more players back to face a fast breakaway. It’s not as if we haven’t been caught out by this before – remember West Brom away for example?

I wouldn’t lay the blame specifically on Noble. I wouldn’t blame Randolph for the end result, although with hindsight (a wonderful thing) I reckon he would have acted differently. No, it is a collective thing that we should be better organised to avoid the situation happening as it did. We broke at pace (unusual I know) at Chelsea on one occasion in the second half and a Chelsea player “took one for the team” to ensure that we didn’t get too close. Once we had found ourselves so outpaced and outnumbered in the breakaway, then we let Hazard go unchallenged. We really should have one or two of our fastest players back. I suspect Byram would have coped better, but don’t get me started on leaving a specialist right back on the bench when we are facing a player of the calibre of Hazard, and using Kouyate in a position that is not natural to him. Actually I reckon Kouyate committed five fouls in the game, usually as a result of being slightly too slow when tackling, nothing too malicious. It was amazing that he avoided a booking from Marriner, who is not my favourite referee, but I thought that the officials had a good game. It is good to look back on a game afterwards without being seething about some of the decisions you have witnessed. Byram may be a bit green in some respects, but to me he looks quite speedy, he looks like he can tackle, and he will get better with experience (if he is given the chance!).

On three occasions we were awarded free kicks inside the Chelsea half out wide. These would have been ideal opportunities for our tall players to go up and a high ball into the box. Not always, but a fair tactic, especially when Carroll plays. So what did we do? On all three Noble took the kick very quickly, sideways or backwards, and we ended up passing it around in our own half, and one of those went all the way back to Randolph. Does anybody sit down after the game and analyse with the players the course of action we have taken, and how we might have done better?

So our naivety cost us the first goal that we conceded, but what about the second? Just a couple of weeks ago I was alarmed at our inability to defend a corner when we allowed West Brom a late equaliser. And in the next game we now allow Chelsea, not particularly noted for their ability at set-pieces to do the same. Surely we must practice defending corners? Everyone must know their job. But what happens? We all get drawn to the near post, Randolph doesn’t come, a West Ham player flicks it on, and the unusually quiet (and non-snarling) Costa is totally unmarked six yards from goal. Quite frankly it is appalling to concede a goal in this fashion. This is what training sessions for the defence should be all about. Did you see how well organised the Chelsea defence were for our corners and set-pieces?

Lanzini’s goal was well taken, but by then it was of course too late. It put some respectability on the scoreboard. I read some internet reaction after the game. Some said we were awful, usually accompanied by expletives, and they are entitled to their opinion. But I don’t think that is a fair reflection of the game. Some said we deserved a point. I don’t concur with that point of view either. We gave it a go, but we were undone by our own mistakes and lack of preparation against a side who will undoubtedly be champions at the end of the season by a big margin I reckon. How many of our team would be in the reckoning to get into the Chelsea team? Obiang and Lanzini might make their bench perhaps?

“How do you fancy going to the cinema on Saturday evening?” my wife asked me earlier in the week. We are regular cinemagoers and she wanted to see one of the films that were in contention for best film at the Oscars on Sunday, Fences. Last week we went to see another of the contenders, Lion, which was an excellent film, and thoroughly enjoyable. She forgot to tell me until Saturday morning that the 8.45 showing was full booked, so she had booked for the earlier 6.00 one. I hadn’t mentioned to her that West Ham were live on TV with a 5.30 kick off.

In the past this would have been a problem but with Sky Plus I was not too concerned. All I had to do was to set the game to record, and then watch it “as live” when we got home at 9pm. This was just a modern day version of the famous Likely Lads episode of fifty or so years ago, where Bob and Terry had to go to great lengths to avoid finding out the score of an international match where they wanted to watch the highlights later in the evening. All I had to do to avoid knowing the outcome was to switch off my mobile phone (a requirement in the cinema anyway), and ensure that the car radio was switched off when we got back into the car after the film. Living in Bury St Edmunds there was little likelihood of hearing anybody talking about the West Ham game.

All went to plan, and as I was watching the preamble to the game, I forgot and switched on my mobile phone, and there was a text from a friend timed at 5.40 which said “What the hell did Kouyate do that for?” I quickly switched off the phone, but could tell that it probably wasn’t good news close to the start of the game. I wondered what he had done. Scored an own goal? Missed an open goal? Still, I had avoided knowing the outcome of the game. As the game started, and only a couple of minutes had elapsed, I watched in horror as Kouyate fouled our old friend Zarate for absolutely no reason with the clumsiest of challenges, and I had to agree with the text. What the hell did Kouyate do that for? Deeney’s penalty was well taken and we were one down almost before we had started. My wife made the comment that perhaps it was a good thing we hadn’t stayed in to watch the game live!

The first half was pretty boring and more than once I was tempted by the fast forward button because I couldn’t really see us scoring. At least the second half started brightly, but it looked like one of those games where we weren’t going to score. I wondered how much benefit we had got from the warm weather training in Dubai? Then Antonio’s pace took him clear and he managed the almost impossible, to hit both posts with one shot, but no fear, Ayew was there to tuck in the rebound. I thought that we’d go looking for the winner then, but our equaliser seemed to rejuvenate Watford who had looked poor in the second half, sitting back defending their one goal lead. And of course they should have scored with the last kick of the game, where Noble played their attack onside, but fortunately they didn’t convert a relatively simple chance.

The irony was that, at the end of the weekend’s games we had actually climbed into ninth place, thanks to Stoke’s capitulation at the hands of our North London neighbours. One things that struck me when reflecting on the game was how far both teams, who are comfortably in mid-table are lagging behind the top six teams in the league. We are long way short in terms of quality of personnel and tactical ideas to get anywhere close.

On Sunday afternoon I watched the EFL Cup Final with two teams I don’t particularly care for serving up an entertaining game for the neutrals. I was neutral until the horrific linesman decision to raise his flag, quite erroneously, to wipe off a perfectly legitimate Southampton goal. From that point I wanted the South Coast team to win and, despite outplaying United for most of the game, they lost to that late Ibrahimovic goal. The game might have turned out quite differently if the early Gabbiadini goal had stood, as it should have done. I then thought back to the night before when watching Match of The Day, in particular Chelsea v Swansea. The game was locked at 1-1 when Swansea had a perfectly good shout for a penalty when Azpilicueta clearly handled the ball, but referee Swarbrick waved play on. Inexplicable, I thought to myself as Chelsea went up the other end and scored to take a 2-1 lead. How the game might have turned out differently if the right decision had been made.

Once again, there were two examples of the “big team” getting away with a dodgy decision which had a big influence on the game. It is hard enough to beat the top teams anyway, without incompetent officials making it even harder. Video replays must be introduced as soon as possible, because with the fast pace of the modern game, and in some cases sheer incompetence, the officials just cannot seem to get important decisions right. And it is amazing how often the big teams are the beneficiaries.