Good afternoon.
Even the most ardent ‘I told you so’ merchants are struggling to find fault with a 3-1 win indoors over the great unwashed from the East End. That said I’m slightly surprised that more hasn’t been made out of how miserable West Ham were. Noble, Nolan and Diame had a bit of a go and when t hey eventually did press there was nobody for the second ball from Carroll’s headers.
Spurs were quite cagey in the opening exchanges and it took Defoe’s first goal before we appeared genuinely comfortable on the ball. Long range ‘shots’ and runs that petered out seemed the order of the day.West Ham were pretty awful. As toothless and witless as their support.
Caulker’s assist aside, Hugo had an decent game. He’s a spritely little fella and I feel a lot more comfortable with him in goal than Brad. He’s not better than Brad, they simply offer different things and I prefer what this guy has. He must however get a settled back four in front of him. Where for art thou, Benny?
Defensively he never really came under much fire. Offensively he made one memorable run during which he sneezed and his frontal lobe shot out of his nose and being the size of an ant’s arse it was lost in the grass. He won’t miss it. Then run ended with him also losing possession.
A remarkably measured game. Clearly he was instructed repeatedly not to hoof and it had sunk in. He was clearly brought on to diffusive the threat of Andy Carroll. The truth is he didn’t succeed and from memory Carroll won every ball. Mmmn.
He was having a steady enough game until the howler. One ‘new’ thing that our lads need to grasp is that punting the thing mindlessly is not on. It invariably hands possession to the other lot.
Commanding and thoughtful. Did anyone else spot him pleading for movement when trying to pass and take throw ins? Oh that must have been Tommy then…
Sam old same old. Some breathtaking passing that at once gave our play a lift. To counter this his movement was abysmal. More life in a tramp’s vest, And this shooting thing needs to be knocked on the head now. He hasn’t scored since forever and needs to stop shooting. I want Carroll given a go.
If all our players were as dedicated as he is, we’d win the Champions League. Left the pitch after vomiting. Word is he ate someone that disagreed with him.
Given how bloody awful they were he should have run rings around them, but he didn’t. I seriously get the impression he joins in when he’s in the mood. The assist was good, but that was an example of simply doing the right thing. Looking up and thinking quickly. He needs to employ this tactic every time he gets the ball.
At last. A proper performance. We now know what it was he was doing in training that kept getting him picked. If he can play like this and build from this, we could be on to something. Again, the opposition was pants, but you can’t help but feel slightly cheered by that showing.
Another improved effort but you have to ask why we aren’t getting this every week. We’ve enough on our plate without supposedly ‘world class’ players going missing or joining in when in the mood. He went through West Ham like he went through Norwich. We need to see him at it every week. No excuses. That Maicon business was a long time ago now.
What a goal. When wasn’t scoring he was of course serving up the usual. Selfish and wasteful. That’s what you get.
He looked pensive and rightly so. The fast food, Persian bazaar culture of the Premier League would have had him listed as having 2 games to save his job or some such gibberish had we lost. Hopefully he has faith in Hugo now. The sooner he can field a steady back four the better. Moussa clearly and understandably isn’t quite match fit. So it’s another week of sticking his head round the physio room door asking for updates.
Love the Sandro comment Harry.Keep that one for the tee shirt.
Dempsey coming out of the Midfield position and finding space up front is much more effective ,than making him a legitimate striker.
Defoe Is great on the run with space,very Greavesie
We need Ade when he gets back, to mature into the unique and exceptional creative striker he can be.He will make Defoe and Dempsey look fantastic
Harry also agree re Lloris.Perfect comment.
I think actually looking back at the game and our games before that that the players are not yet sold on AVB.That this game it felt better.That the hedging by Bale previously and Lennon in theis one are our players trying to feel confortablewith AVB’s system and possibly AVB even adjusting somewhat by allowing the players some voice with their instincs.
If it can steadily get better,even slowly I will be happy this season. The jury is still out.the flow came back in this one.Its encouraging.But its still West Ham. Still its encouraging.
Still holding judgement, but I really liked what I saw-they played the free-flowing football I’d hoped and yearned for-and with confidence from the outset-what that tells me is one of 2 things-either it was because it was Wesss-Taymmmm-or the manager got them ticking over, despite two really indifferent games previously-and that’s good management in my book. Also-any manager worth his salt-will stand by his convictions-When the team was called out-Dempsey and Hudd’s names were less than enthusiastically greeted (and for good reason) but to AVB’s credit-he was right-wasn’t he?
Dempsey is not a great player but he can be potent in front of goal.Sometimes players try too hard and it gets worse,not better (i.e. Torres) but eventually they do find their groove.
I think this is the case with Dempsey.
Think his best game is creeping up from midfield and finding that space in the box and can make it happen. This was a start.
Lennon reminds me of greaves when he runs against a player into the box,but thats where it ends.If he had scored instead of passing to Defoe,that would have been a Greaves type goal,
By the way great to see that Gilly was at the lane.I shall be forever grateful that I was able to get to the lane regularly when they played in the days of black and white and was able to see the gmen in operation,unbelievable memories ,just sorry they were not saved on film.those were the days when I used to be a proper supporter ,never booed only at the ref.
As a teenager, My old mum worked with a player we had called Tony Want-anyway-I got wind of his 21st birthday bash, and begged my mum to get me an invite-which she did-my ever lasting memory of that night was seeing Gilly wankered with a bottle of scotch to himself-and couldn’t Eddie Baily swear!
I’m a bit younger than you but that must be an amazing memory… That was the ‘Glory Game’ squad wasn’t it. Maybe a year or so later?
I remember Tony Want. Full back and England Youth skipper. Don’t recall he got that many games for us, but it was about the time Joe Kinnear and Cyril Knowles were the regular full-backs
yep,he went to Birmingham a while after,and played with another schoolboy team-mate of mine there,watched them play and beat us 3-1 at the Lane ’75
@ES-yes,but I was only a kid,a near neighbor was John Pratt,whose parents ran our local sweet shop,and numerous boxers such as John H Stracey, John l Gardener-Peter Eubanks-Maurice Hope-and many others-tough area-but great times all the same
Nostalgia??? LOL!
Gilzean was fantastic.Playing off of Greaves and feeding Greaves with glancing headers,he offered what Ade could offer Defoe and that is great supply as well as scoring himself.
I think really Berbatov had that quality to glance those headers down (never saw it much at United)
Ade has to get into it and be committed to the game and stock mucking about
like the way Ddoris grabs the ball and stops the game, it breaks up the oppos impetus and gives us a breather ,back into the game on our terms.
I had an oppo impetus last year, it’s worked wonders….
Dempsey’s got a whole lot of proving still to do. Better last night but against a load of old pants team. Encouraging but i won’t be out to get my number ‘2’ shirt just yet!! Number 2 for a forward just shouldn’t be allowed.. might help to fool the opposition though “why’s the rightback so far out of position” then he curls in a beauty… Yeah right.
I will be happy as long as he does not play like number 2.
Really I think Lloris will be great for us for years to come and he has a strong mind that will help the other players.He is very committed you can see that.
Great move to buy him.
You’ve got to love Redschnapps… he remains true to
his philosophytype… “when you don’t have the ball run after it”…”run around a bit”, classic…I see his trusty assistant was in the Landrover.. I wonder did Joe Jordan get a gig as well?
Harry, Bondy an’ Big Joe-the Three Profiteers eh?
that’s got legs!
I had to laugh at this.
When he was speaking scouse…he was quite convincing.This casts doubt on his origins.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20511307
Apart from hell, where is he from?
Both my Parents were Irish and I live in Ireland,but if I started talking to my pals in Oirish they’d laugh at me,I’ll always be a blow in.
Apparently he was shrugging his shoulders like the ‘Allo ‘Allo actors.
Imagine all the overseas players doing a “posh english accent” at the next presser.
Ade would be good!
:wassat:
Benny..?