As West Ham was playing Forest in the cup, I was moving my mother into sheltered accommodation. She's leaving the flat she's lived in for 58 years and now often doesn't recognise as her home. In the brickwork by the front door, there is a gouged crossed hammers from my childhood (as well as WHUFC). I think I got told off for doing that, but not much, as Dad was the person responsible for taking me to West Ham.
My eldest daughter was assisting in the move (as was The Controller [and her mother] who assisted and project managed at the same time) and was able to source the progress of the game on her phone to hear Radio 5 Live Extra's commentary.
We were winning immediately and then predictably were behind. What wasn't predictable was that we came back, took a lead and held on to win.
And during all of this I was ferrying bits and pieces around and trying to be sure my Mum was happy. I can't say I gave the football much thought, but I did make sure to tell her we'd won, which she thought was good. As she did whenever Dad and I came home and we'd won, but she did rather come from the 'it's only a game' school when it came to losing. Just like The Controller.
And on days like Sunday, it does rather give it a perspective.
But it's still good to win ...
Monday 31 January 2011
Thursday 27 January 2011
The Man Who Mistook His Football Team For A Life: Carling Cup Semi-Final Second Leg: Birmingham 3 - 1 West Ham (4-3 aggregate); 26 January
West Ham's season in micrososm was on display here. Easily in control for the first half, followed by the usual collapse and defeat in the second half. We're not bottom of the league for nothing.
More to be reflected on was what it said about me. The Controller ended the evening almost as annoyed with me as I was with everyone connected with the management of West Ham. She very forcefully expressed the view that watching my team made me a bad-tempered, drama queen. She didn't quite get to saying it's only a game, but there was definitely that as a subtext. She pointed out that our dogs wouldn't stay in the room while I'm watching West Ham (any other match they're perfectly ok with, if not ready to discuss the finer points of tactics). As the clincher, she maintained that I'd created the same misery in my children and was now about to pass it on to my grandson. It amounted to emotional abuse.
There's some truth in all of that, I think. Watching West Ham has, over the years, given me enormous pleasure at too infrequent intervals. It has provided some of the peaks of experience to look back on. But those are only peaks because they stand in the middle of troughs, and lately there have been too many troughs and too few peaks for me to hold a balanced view.
But it's also an opportunity to channel other feelings (if the Scientologists will permit use of the verb). When there is a high level of pressure and stress in real life, the game is a respite. So my mother's dementia and the watershed moment of moving her into sheltered accommodation (with all the attendant almost unbelievable hassle of dealing with the bureaucracy of social services, benefits and pensions agency, the mechanics of the move) can have its emotional freight stowed onto a football match. The pressures of a job requiring me to promote swingeing cuts that will directly affect people's employment and try to do it honestly and openly and maintain a public service, all at breakneck speed to impossible deadlines, can be parked on the touchline for ninety minutes (plus stoppage time).
But when yet again the team fails to deliver the minimum that a half-competent professional organisation should, then the times I feel like swearing at the phone as I get passed to yet another person who can't deal with a pension credit or care plan, the times when I can't say, no, stick £49 millions savings, it was the bankers who fucked up, not the public services and, hey, they're still getting shedloads of money, well, I can do a credit transfer of my feelings to West Ham.
But they deserve it in their own right as well.
And at least being beaten by Birmingham (why did Lee Bowyer never score goals like that when playing for us?) will mean I can't be patronised by Arsenal fans after being thrashed in a Wembley final.
And if Avram is breaking the habit of getting teams to finals, perhaps he'll also break the habit of getting teams relegated.
Yeah, right.
More to be reflected on was what it said about me. The Controller ended the evening almost as annoyed with me as I was with everyone connected with the management of West Ham. She very forcefully expressed the view that watching my team made me a bad-tempered, drama queen. She didn't quite get to saying it's only a game, but there was definitely that as a subtext. She pointed out that our dogs wouldn't stay in the room while I'm watching West Ham (any other match they're perfectly ok with, if not ready to discuss the finer points of tactics). As the clincher, she maintained that I'd created the same misery in my children and was now about to pass it on to my grandson. It amounted to emotional abuse.
There's some truth in all of that, I think. Watching West Ham has, over the years, given me enormous pleasure at too infrequent intervals. It has provided some of the peaks of experience to look back on. But those are only peaks because they stand in the middle of troughs, and lately there have been too many troughs and too few peaks for me to hold a balanced view.
But it's also an opportunity to channel other feelings (if the Scientologists will permit use of the verb). When there is a high level of pressure and stress in real life, the game is a respite. So my mother's dementia and the watershed moment of moving her into sheltered accommodation (with all the attendant almost unbelievable hassle of dealing with the bureaucracy of social services, benefits and pensions agency, the mechanics of the move) can have its emotional freight stowed onto a football match. The pressures of a job requiring me to promote swingeing cuts that will directly affect people's employment and try to do it honestly and openly and maintain a public service, all at breakneck speed to impossible deadlines, can be parked on the touchline for ninety minutes (plus stoppage time).
But when yet again the team fails to deliver the minimum that a half-competent professional organisation should, then the times I feel like swearing at the phone as I get passed to yet another person who can't deal with a pension credit or care plan, the times when I can't say, no, stick £49 millions savings, it was the bankers who fucked up, not the public services and, hey, they're still getting shedloads of money, well, I can do a credit transfer of my feelings to West Ham.
But they deserve it in their own right as well.
And at least being beaten by Birmingham (why did Lee Bowyer never score goals like that when playing for us?) will mean I can't be patronised by Arsenal fans after being thrashed in a Wembley final.
And if Avram is breaking the habit of getting teams to finals, perhaps he'll also break the habit of getting teams relegated.
Yeah, right.
Wednesday 26 January 2011
Carling Cup SemiFinal second leg: Birmingham 0 - 1 West Ham (half time)
It's the hope that gets you .....
Sunday 23 January 2011
On The Road Again: Everton 2 - 2 West Ham: 22 January
I could become convinced of malign forces at work where West Ham is concerned.
Consider this week's instalment from the wacky world of The Irons. The week began with the 'Avram's going, whoops, no he's not' saga as perfectly orchestrated as a silent comedy featuring the Keystone Cops careering from disaster to disaster at breakneck speed. Eventually, the Manager got the resounding vote of confidence expected from the board, with an unbelievably insouciant statement about how we all needed to get behind the manager in this trying time. Yeah, well, who was leaking to the press about how many games he had to save his job, and how Martin O'Neill was going to take over? The saga has achieved the seemingly unachievable - a feeling of pity for the manager who, let's not forget, has presided over a season of towering ineptitude.
Then there was the deafening silence in the transfer window. None out - not even Behrami, who is fit but not playing so he can't be injured and not available to permanently not play. Last weekend Fiorentina was a done deal, supposedly, but not now. And, ominously, none in after Wayne Bridge, star of 'Nightmare on Green Street: the Arsenal'. With his loan and £90k a week wages we don't have space for the other loan we could have or the money to pay the wages, supposedly, of Joe Cole (prodigal son of this parish). We're keeping the space for the priority of signing someone, anyone, as a striker. Where's Big Benni when you need him? Not gone to QPR, that's for sure, who have taken a fair time to have a look at him (well, there is a lot to take in) before deciding no thanks.
And then there was the West Ham bid for the Olympic Stadium. It seems many West Ham fans are coming round to the idea because it would stop Spurs getting it, but it remains a very, very, very bad idea on so many levels. The whole Olympic bid was based on lies (just look back at how much it was supposed to cost) and a rosy presentation of 'Legacy' for the youth of Britain's multiethnic tomorrow. But after every Olympic Games in modern history, active participation in sport has declined rather than increased. Across the world, herds of white elephants of different stadia occupy former Olympic cities. Beijing's Bird's Nest was architecturally stunning but it's not been used much since 2008. And football in a stadium with a running track makes the crowd even less of a participant in the experience and more of a spectator of the entertainment. Great for the world-class Madonna concerts, though (when was a Madonna Concert ever world-class?)
And so, at the end of the week, to the football, which I didn't and haven't seen. But it was yet another hard-luck story compounded by self-inflicted idiocy. To go ahead six minutes from the end and be unable to win is par for the course. To handicap the team by leaping a barrier into the crowd and getting a second booking is stupidity, even if Piquionne had just scored. But even with ten men, you'd have thought, any team other than West Ham would have held on. Although, with every forward substituted, all we were going to do was defend, and we all know how good at that we are.
Still bottom, still going down, still no new players and still hoping to move to the Olympic Stadium. At least we have losing the second leg of the semi-final to watch this week .... with no available fowards except Big Benni. Cometh the hour, cometh the man-mountain?
Consider this week's instalment from the wacky world of The Irons. The week began with the 'Avram's going, whoops, no he's not' saga as perfectly orchestrated as a silent comedy featuring the Keystone Cops careering from disaster to disaster at breakneck speed. Eventually, the Manager got the resounding vote of confidence expected from the board, with an unbelievably insouciant statement about how we all needed to get behind the manager in this trying time. Yeah, well, who was leaking to the press about how many games he had to save his job, and how Martin O'Neill was going to take over? The saga has achieved the seemingly unachievable - a feeling of pity for the manager who, let's not forget, has presided over a season of towering ineptitude.
Then there was the deafening silence in the transfer window. None out - not even Behrami, who is fit but not playing so he can't be injured and not available to permanently not play. Last weekend Fiorentina was a done deal, supposedly, but not now. And, ominously, none in after Wayne Bridge, star of 'Nightmare on Green Street: the Arsenal'. With his loan and £90k a week wages we don't have space for the other loan we could have or the money to pay the wages, supposedly, of Joe Cole (prodigal son of this parish). We're keeping the space for the priority of signing someone, anyone, as a striker. Where's Big Benni when you need him? Not gone to QPR, that's for sure, who have taken a fair time to have a look at him (well, there is a lot to take in) before deciding no thanks.
And then there was the West Ham bid for the Olympic Stadium. It seems many West Ham fans are coming round to the idea because it would stop Spurs getting it, but it remains a very, very, very bad idea on so many levels. The whole Olympic bid was based on lies (just look back at how much it was supposed to cost) and a rosy presentation of 'Legacy' for the youth of Britain's multiethnic tomorrow. But after every Olympic Games in modern history, active participation in sport has declined rather than increased. Across the world, herds of white elephants of different stadia occupy former Olympic cities. Beijing's Bird's Nest was architecturally stunning but it's not been used much since 2008. And football in a stadium with a running track makes the crowd even less of a participant in the experience and more of a spectator of the entertainment. Great for the world-class Madonna concerts, though (when was a Madonna Concert ever world-class?)
And so, at the end of the week, to the football, which I didn't and haven't seen. But it was yet another hard-luck story compounded by self-inflicted idiocy. To go ahead six minutes from the end and be unable to win is par for the course. To handicap the team by leaping a barrier into the crowd and getting a second booking is stupidity, even if Piquionne had just scored. But even with ten men, you'd have thought, any team other than West Ham would have held on. Although, with every forward substituted, all we were going to do was defend, and we all know how good at that we are.
Still bottom, still going down, still no new players and still hoping to move to the Olympic Stadium. At least we have losing the second leg of the semi-final to watch this week .... with no available fowards except Big Benni. Cometh the hour, cometh the man-mountain?
Tuesday 18 January 2011
You Keep Me Hangin' On: West Ham 0 - 3 Arsenal; 15 January
The game was an irrelevance, really. We all expected to lose and were duly rewarded for our expectations. Arsenal looked in a different league to us and next year they will be. Any chance we may have had of an unlikely result was severely diminished by the news that Super Scott was unable to play with an ankle injury and then Mark Noble, the Robin-like boy wonder to his Batman superhero, left the field in the first half with an injury. A midfield of Sears, Kovac, Spector and Hines supplemented by Rigor was never going to compete. A defence with Faubert managing to look a better full-back than Bridge on his disastrous debut gave Rob Green ample opportunity to show off. And Carlton laboured unconvincingly yet again.
So we were lucky to get nil.
At the time we all thought it was bye-bye Avram. That included Avram. But it hasn't happened and now might be the time to reflect on the competence displayed by the ruling triumvirate of The Pornographers and Lord Sugar's Suck-up and their contribution to the slow-motion, technicolor and 3D disaster movie that is West Ham in recent times.
When Sold and Gullivan took over by acquiring 51% of the club, it was a subliminal confirmation of their cheapskate approach. If all the protestations of love, stability and European football were more than the regulation new owner bullshit, at least they would have bought the lot.
And while they have regularly castigated the previous owners for their profligate ways leaving the club desperately in debt (and they have good evidence with players like Kieron Dyer), they bought (not the manager) Big Benni from Blackburn's reserves, hired Mido (over-paid at the reputed one grand a week) and have now brought in Wayne Bridge reputedly on £90k a week wages. So much for Prudence.
In the summer their transfer policy was absurd. They bought a couple of young players - Reid and Barrera - for a goodly part of a very limited budget - and neither is good enough to start. They brought in loan signings who are not worth their place (Ben Haim), playing more than was expected of squad signings (Piquionne), or much less effective than they think they are (Obinna). The one proven player was available to us because of his injury record (Hitzlsperger) and lo, he has been injured all season. Kieron Dyer anyone?
So a squad that wasn't good enough last year has, arguably, been made worse by their acquisitions.
And then there was their choice of manager.
At least Avram Grant has experience of relegation struggles. To which he is adding. What he hasn't got is successful experience of relegation struggles. And nor will he have after this season. He has made some key players worse. For all the crowd's remorseless haranguing of Carlton Cole, he clearly has the power and talent to be a handful for every central defence. Under Zola he improved beyond all measure to become an England squad player. If his trajectory of improvement had been maintained he would have been some player now. But he has gone backwards and clearly lacks confidence - as well as service usually. That has to be down to the coaching and management. While I might long for West Ham to have the Fernando Torres of two seasons ago, I know that's not going to happen. But to turn possibly decent players into less than the Torres of this season is teeth-gnashingly incompetent.
But the playing side management incompetence is more than matched in the boardroom.
Zole was serially undermined by The Pornographers. Fair enough, he wasn't their appointment and last season he perfected his impression of the rabbit in the headlights. But when the co-Chairman denounces the performances in the programme, it hardly helps the cause. When the co-Chairman subsequently announces all the squad is for sale except Super Scott, I think the phrase 'lost the dressing room' is inadequate to describe what the players probably think of The Pornographers.
And to seek to avoid paying Zola's contract by presenting his justified comment 'Jesus Christ, what's going on?' as breach of contract (a ruse that didn't work), reinforced the ducking and diving, cheapskate image all over again. So his sacking was badly handled.
And the current events around Avram Grant have had the quite amazing oucome of making people feel sorry for him. We all know he's not adequate to the task. We have known it since the first month for all his ability to see improvements in performances and express optimism about future results. But the appalling lack of class with which the club has handled the 'will he be gone, won't he be gone' events of recent days has served to emphasise the dignity with which he has coped.
When the BBC and Sky Sports and every national newspaper confidently asserts that he is to be replaced by Martin O'Neill, it is clear they have the story from somewhere. Moreover, they will have had confirmation of the story. And they got it on the day of the Arsenal game, before the game. Great preparation.
The story is followed by silence from the club. No denials, no confirmation, no vote of confidence. Nada, zilch. And, incidentally, nothing from Martin O'Neill to deny it. Sam Allardyce, when questioned refused to discuss it because, he said, Avram Grant had not been relieved of his duties - much to his credit, I think.
And then, according to reports again, O'Neill backs out disenchanted with how the matter has been handled by West Ham. What did he expect from our owners?
Now I know they made most of their money in the pornography industry. And I guess it's a different business. Well, they've certainly got transferable skills. What really counts in the pornographic film industry - I'm told - is the money shot. But it's always preceded by fake hyperbole about size and importance and pleasure and price. While we've not seen the money shot, we've had 'save our season' games, 'biggest game of the past twenty years', reduced rates for numerous games and enticing offers of 'hospitality', as well as one mildly entertaining debut (by Obinna) being hailed as the birth of a West Ham legend.
What really counts in The Sport news (allegedly) paper, is the ability to present the most far-fetched ravings as reported truth and the number and size of the mammaries on display. So The Pornographers' comments each home game in the programme fit the kind of 'reporting' in the Sport and they are, well, an enormous pair of tits regularly on display.
The Vice-Chairman, Karren Brady, is supposedly running this on a day-to-day basis.
Inevitably, it's time for her to go, too - and take her Olympic Stadium dream with her.
If only we could hear Lord Sugar's punchline for the lot of them.
So we were lucky to get nil.
At the time we all thought it was bye-bye Avram. That included Avram. But it hasn't happened and now might be the time to reflect on the competence displayed by the ruling triumvirate of The Pornographers and Lord Sugar's Suck-up and their contribution to the slow-motion, technicolor and 3D disaster movie that is West Ham in recent times.
When Sold and Gullivan took over by acquiring 51% of the club, it was a subliminal confirmation of their cheapskate approach. If all the protestations of love, stability and European football were more than the regulation new owner bullshit, at least they would have bought the lot.
And while they have regularly castigated the previous owners for their profligate ways leaving the club desperately in debt (and they have good evidence with players like Kieron Dyer), they bought (not the manager) Big Benni from Blackburn's reserves, hired Mido (over-paid at the reputed one grand a week) and have now brought in Wayne Bridge reputedly on £90k a week wages. So much for Prudence.
In the summer their transfer policy was absurd. They bought a couple of young players - Reid and Barrera - for a goodly part of a very limited budget - and neither is good enough to start. They brought in loan signings who are not worth their place (Ben Haim), playing more than was expected of squad signings (Piquionne), or much less effective than they think they are (Obinna). The one proven player was available to us because of his injury record (Hitzlsperger) and lo, he has been injured all season. Kieron Dyer anyone?
So a squad that wasn't good enough last year has, arguably, been made worse by their acquisitions.
And then there was their choice of manager.
At least Avram Grant has experience of relegation struggles. To which he is adding. What he hasn't got is successful experience of relegation struggles. And nor will he have after this season. He has made some key players worse. For all the crowd's remorseless haranguing of Carlton Cole, he clearly has the power and talent to be a handful for every central defence. Under Zola he improved beyond all measure to become an England squad player. If his trajectory of improvement had been maintained he would have been some player now. But he has gone backwards and clearly lacks confidence - as well as service usually. That has to be down to the coaching and management. While I might long for West Ham to have the Fernando Torres of two seasons ago, I know that's not going to happen. But to turn possibly decent players into less than the Torres of this season is teeth-gnashingly incompetent.
But the playing side management incompetence is more than matched in the boardroom.
Zole was serially undermined by The Pornographers. Fair enough, he wasn't their appointment and last season he perfected his impression of the rabbit in the headlights. But when the co-Chairman denounces the performances in the programme, it hardly helps the cause. When the co-Chairman subsequently announces all the squad is for sale except Super Scott, I think the phrase 'lost the dressing room' is inadequate to describe what the players probably think of The Pornographers.
And to seek to avoid paying Zola's contract by presenting his justified comment 'Jesus Christ, what's going on?' as breach of contract (a ruse that didn't work), reinforced the ducking and diving, cheapskate image all over again. So his sacking was badly handled.
And the current events around Avram Grant have had the quite amazing oucome of making people feel sorry for him. We all know he's not adequate to the task. We have known it since the first month for all his ability to see improvements in performances and express optimism about future results. But the appalling lack of class with which the club has handled the 'will he be gone, won't he be gone' events of recent days has served to emphasise the dignity with which he has coped.
When the BBC and Sky Sports and every national newspaper confidently asserts that he is to be replaced by Martin O'Neill, it is clear they have the story from somewhere. Moreover, they will have had confirmation of the story. And they got it on the day of the Arsenal game, before the game. Great preparation.
The story is followed by silence from the club. No denials, no confirmation, no vote of confidence. Nada, zilch. And, incidentally, nothing from Martin O'Neill to deny it. Sam Allardyce, when questioned refused to discuss it because, he said, Avram Grant had not been relieved of his duties - much to his credit, I think.
And then, according to reports again, O'Neill backs out disenchanted with how the matter has been handled by West Ham. What did he expect from our owners?
Now I know they made most of their money in the pornography industry. And I guess it's a different business. Well, they've certainly got transferable skills. What really counts in the pornographic film industry - I'm told - is the money shot. But it's always preceded by fake hyperbole about size and importance and pleasure and price. While we've not seen the money shot, we've had 'save our season' games, 'biggest game of the past twenty years', reduced rates for numerous games and enticing offers of 'hospitality', as well as one mildly entertaining debut (by Obinna) being hailed as the birth of a West Ham legend.
What really counts in The Sport news (allegedly) paper, is the ability to present the most far-fetched ravings as reported truth and the number and size of the mammaries on display. So The Pornographers' comments each home game in the programme fit the kind of 'reporting' in the Sport and they are, well, an enormous pair of tits regularly on display.
The Vice-Chairman, Karren Brady, is supposedly running this on a day-to-day basis.
Inevitably, it's time for her to go, too - and take her Olympic Stadium dream with her.
If only we could hear Lord Sugar's punchline for the lot of them.
Saturday 15 January 2011
Avram's Final Curtain? Before the Arsenal Game; 15 January
Tomorrow is my mother's 87th birthday. Not that she will know this with her advancing dementia. But at Christmas she was at our house while I and three of my children watched West Ham play Fulham.
She responded with laughter at the abuse we vented at the television in the poor first half display and was sufficiently sharp to ask whether we would be doing any better. Obviously not and not just because I'm as old as 'Appy 'Arry Redknapp.
But as well as the players, we all had and have an opinion on the manager and the owners and their Vice Chairman Karren B (Yes Lord Sugar, No Lord Sugar ....)
We've been more or less decided since, well, the day of his appointment, that Avram didn't inspire confidence. For all his hero status at Portsmouth last season, he'd spent the season in the bottom three and ended in relegation and would have done without the points deduction. Fluking a cup run to lose in the final didn't seem adequate compensation. We've lost finals before and it doesn't feel good. And the transfer comings and goings did not set the pulse racing. Reid, Piquionne, Ben Haim, Barrera, Obinna? Ho hum.
The dour persona was not particularly engaging and the revelations of the visits to the, ahem, massage parlour, added to the general seediness of the club with our Pornographer cockney boy owners.
And the season has more or less gone as expected. Badly.
But the reports today in all media outlets suggest that this will be Avram's last game in charge and he'll be replaced by Martin O'Neill. Which is, to me, a surprise. And one which I welcome immediately before my suspicions kick in. The Controller comments that with regard to West Ham I'm a glass half-empty person. She reminds me we won against Birmingham in midweek, but all I could see was inevitable donwside (the 'yes, but ...' approach). So I'll give rein to my suspicions. Why would O'Neill come to West Ham in a relegation struggle (other than an obvious love for claret and blue)? His reputation is bigger than our club's. He's a success as a manager and would be in demand elsewhere. Whenever there's a Premiership job, there's speculation about O'Neill. But we're not exactly big league, are we?
And would he (would you) want to work for Sold and Brady? He managed to fall out with Lerner who has invested in Villa and let him manage without interference. Whereas Sold haven't invested and regularly interfere. Perhaps it's a Brummie thing - as a former Villa manager he wants to do down Birmingham in the semi (or take down the former Birmingham owners of West Ham from the Premiership). Or maybe it's Steve Walford who was a truly dreadful left back for us (and there's been competition as dreadful full-backs go down the years), who's always been part of O'Neill's management team, who fancies coming back.
Maybe it's just the first job he's been offered and after half a season he's missing it. But if Villa prompted him to walk out, god alone knows what he'll do at Upton Park.
I can't wait to find out. But first there's the little matter of today's game against Arsenal. Carling Cup preview, or beaten semi-finalists' might have been?
She responded with laughter at the abuse we vented at the television in the poor first half display and was sufficiently sharp to ask whether we would be doing any better. Obviously not and not just because I'm as old as 'Appy 'Arry Redknapp.
But as well as the players, we all had and have an opinion on the manager and the owners and their Vice Chairman Karren B (Yes Lord Sugar, No Lord Sugar ....)
We've been more or less decided since, well, the day of his appointment, that Avram didn't inspire confidence. For all his hero status at Portsmouth last season, he'd spent the season in the bottom three and ended in relegation and would have done without the points deduction. Fluking a cup run to lose in the final didn't seem adequate compensation. We've lost finals before and it doesn't feel good. And the transfer comings and goings did not set the pulse racing. Reid, Piquionne, Ben Haim, Barrera, Obinna? Ho hum.
The dour persona was not particularly engaging and the revelations of the visits to the, ahem, massage parlour, added to the general seediness of the club with our Pornographer cockney boy owners.
And the season has more or less gone as expected. Badly.
But the reports today in all media outlets suggest that this will be Avram's last game in charge and he'll be replaced by Martin O'Neill. Which is, to me, a surprise. And one which I welcome immediately before my suspicions kick in. The Controller comments that with regard to West Ham I'm a glass half-empty person. She reminds me we won against Birmingham in midweek, but all I could see was inevitable donwside (the 'yes, but ...' approach). So I'll give rein to my suspicions. Why would O'Neill come to West Ham in a relegation struggle (other than an obvious love for claret and blue)? His reputation is bigger than our club's. He's a success as a manager and would be in demand elsewhere. Whenever there's a Premiership job, there's speculation about O'Neill. But we're not exactly big league, are we?
And would he (would you) want to work for Sold and Brady? He managed to fall out with Lerner who has invested in Villa and let him manage without interference. Whereas Sold haven't invested and regularly interfere. Perhaps it's a Brummie thing - as a former Villa manager he wants to do down Birmingham in the semi (or take down the former Birmingham owners of West Ham from the Premiership). Or maybe it's Steve Walford who was a truly dreadful left back for us (and there's been competition as dreadful full-backs go down the years), who's always been part of O'Neill's management team, who fancies coming back.
Maybe it's just the first job he's been offered and after half a season he's missing it. But if Villa prompted him to walk out, god alone knows what he'll do at Upton Park.
I can't wait to find out. But first there's the little matter of today's game against Arsenal. Carling Cup preview, or beaten semi-finalists' might have been?
Friday 14 January 2011
The Famous Two Halves: West Ham 2 - 1 Birmingham; Carling Cup Semi-final First Leg: 11 January.
Before this match, Avram Grant 's dead-man-walking graveyard humour was in evidence when he said that the owners had expressed a wish to lose by a big margin (so he could be sacked). I know plenty of West Ham fans who also wouldn't have minded that. After all, we weren't confident that we'd beat Birmingham in the first leg, let alone over two legs. And if we did, we expected to play Arsenal in the final and not only would we not win, but if Newcastle could beat us 5-0 (before losing 2-0 themselves to Stevenage to demonstrate what a strong team they are), we were in severe danger of the kind of embarrassing result that lasts forever in our and opposition's memory.
So losing and sacking Avram looked a decent option.
But not apparently to the team.
Before the kick-off, the sight of Wally Downes (about whom I know nothing but since the papers say that Neil Warnock hates him, I've decided he must be a great guy. That logic does not extend to El-hadj Diouf, by the way) drilling a backline with Faubert and Upson as the fullbacks and with Reid in central defence more or less guaranteed that Tompkins and Green would have plenty of opportunity to give a Man of the Match display.
But the team was a revelation in the first half of this game. The defence and midfield was organised and disciplined. Throughout the team there was a drive, commitment and purpose rarely evident this season. Birmingham were allowed to have the ball with their centre backs, while West Ham kept a compact shape. When Birmingham lost the ball (or, more often, it was won by a West Ham player), we broke with pace and precision. Only Foster in their goal and some fairly desperate defending kept the score to 1-0 to us at half-time.
My eldest son was driving to Brasov in Romania during the first half of the game and demanded text updates. At half time he had arrived and established an internet connection in time to see Alan Hansen announce that it was only a matter of time before West Ham scored a second and that Birmingham might as well not have turned up. As he succinctly put it, 'that's us fucked'.
And so it came to pass. Avram's inspirational half-time team talk must have been along the lines of: 'you're expected to lose this game, but you're playing as if you'll win. Please slow the pace down, drop off and allow their midfield to work the ball. Then, don't get tight in the penalty area for any crosses'. It must have been that because the team followed those instructions to a T.
And suddenly this was a different game, Birmingham equalised, the crowd was silent and we awaited the inevitable second (and perhaps third or fourth) goals. My daughter who, unlike everybody else in the crowd, did not follow the play from a throw-in, suddenly shrieked 'oh my god, he's got away with it; I can't believe he's got away with it.' What she had seen, she informed us, was Obinna kicking Larsson in the nuts off the ball (the football, that is. Very much on the gonad ball). However, everybody watching on television had seen it and so, apparently, had the assistant referee, so Obinna was rightly sent off and we had gone from cruising the game, to letting in an equaliser and losing a player in about 20 minutes.
So much for the discipline and endeavour of the first half.
And then football demonstrated another punchline that earns it the 'funny old game' tag.
We managed to put a startlingly good move together ending a cross for Carlton Cole. He pulled another from his repertoire of unbelievable goals. Last time it was a crafty dummy/complete miskick (choose according to taste) that led to a defender scoring a dopey own goal. This time it was a miskick with the softest of connections and Ben Foster somehow allowed the ball across the line and we were unbelievably, unaccountably, 2-1 up.
At the beginning of the second half the Brummie muppets were, in their nasal whine, accusing Rob Green of letting his country down. Now their goalkeeper had well and truly let his team down. 'Too shit for England' the South Bank crowed with delight.
And that was it, more or less, apart from the routine scares that the West Ham 'defence' kept coming to the end.
And Avram keeps his job (without a vote of confidence).
The next night Ipswich beat Arsenal 1-0 in their first leg. I still expect a Birmingham-Arsenal final (given our dreadful away record and Birmingham's home form).
Because, in a two-legged tie, we're only half way through, we're winning and it's a game of two halves.. ..... but as it's also a funny old game, choose your cliche.
So losing and sacking Avram looked a decent option.
But not apparently to the team.
Before the kick-off, the sight of Wally Downes (about whom I know nothing but since the papers say that Neil Warnock hates him, I've decided he must be a great guy. That logic does not extend to El-hadj Diouf, by the way) drilling a backline with Faubert and Upson as the fullbacks and with Reid in central defence more or less guaranteed that Tompkins and Green would have plenty of opportunity to give a Man of the Match display.
But the team was a revelation in the first half of this game. The defence and midfield was organised and disciplined. Throughout the team there was a drive, commitment and purpose rarely evident this season. Birmingham were allowed to have the ball with their centre backs, while West Ham kept a compact shape. When Birmingham lost the ball (or, more often, it was won by a West Ham player), we broke with pace and precision. Only Foster in their goal and some fairly desperate defending kept the score to 1-0 to us at half-time.
My eldest son was driving to Brasov in Romania during the first half of the game and demanded text updates. At half time he had arrived and established an internet connection in time to see Alan Hansen announce that it was only a matter of time before West Ham scored a second and that Birmingham might as well not have turned up. As he succinctly put it, 'that's us fucked'.
And so it came to pass. Avram's inspirational half-time team talk must have been along the lines of: 'you're expected to lose this game, but you're playing as if you'll win. Please slow the pace down, drop off and allow their midfield to work the ball. Then, don't get tight in the penalty area for any crosses'. It must have been that because the team followed those instructions to a T.
And suddenly this was a different game, Birmingham equalised, the crowd was silent and we awaited the inevitable second (and perhaps third or fourth) goals. My daughter who, unlike everybody else in the crowd, did not follow the play from a throw-in, suddenly shrieked 'oh my god, he's got away with it; I can't believe he's got away with it.' What she had seen, she informed us, was Obinna kicking Larsson in the nuts off the ball (the football, that is. Very much on the gonad ball). However, everybody watching on television had seen it and so, apparently, had the assistant referee, so Obinna was rightly sent off and we had gone from cruising the game, to letting in an equaliser and losing a player in about 20 minutes.
So much for the discipline and endeavour of the first half.
And then football demonstrated another punchline that earns it the 'funny old game' tag.
We managed to put a startlingly good move together ending a cross for Carlton Cole. He pulled another from his repertoire of unbelievable goals. Last time it was a crafty dummy/complete miskick (choose according to taste) that led to a defender scoring a dopey own goal. This time it was a miskick with the softest of connections and Ben Foster somehow allowed the ball across the line and we were unbelievably, unaccountably, 2-1 up.
At the beginning of the second half the Brummie muppets were, in their nasal whine, accusing Rob Green of letting his country down. Now their goalkeeper had well and truly let his team down. 'Too shit for England' the South Bank crowed with delight.
And that was it, more or less, apart from the routine scares that the West Ham 'defence' kept coming to the end.
And Avram keeps his job (without a vote of confidence).
The next night Ipswich beat Arsenal 1-0 in their first leg. I still expect a Birmingham-Arsenal final (given our dreadful away record and Birmingham's home form).
Because, in a two-legged tie, we're only half way through, we're winning and it's a game of two halves.. ..... but as it's also a funny old game, choose your cliche.
Saturday 8 January 2011
Down for the Cup? West Ham 2 - 0 Barnsley; 8 January
Today The Controller had decided we were going to (re)start house-hunting. Since she has been convinced by television property programmes, it was more a case of Location Hunting. As we've already tried (in chronological order) Bishops Stortford, Billericay, Brentwood and Shenfield without finding anything we both liked and could afford (even if we had sold our present house) and decided to give it a rest until the spring, January was an obvious spring day to begin again. This was partly prompted by The Controller discovering that I was not intending to go to today's cup game.
My willingness to spend even the much reduced ticket prices to watch our rubbish team struggle and eventually win unconvincingly against a lower division team was non-existant. Had I known the alternative was house-hunting, I might have reconsidered, but it was not to be.
So today was scouting out Saffron Walden and Royston. I rather put the damper on Royston by giving my opinion (based on very limited acquaintance) that it was a bit of a tip. However, Saffron Walden proved to be a hit, so, for the immediate future, the location is sorted. But as The Controller had arranged to view two houses in Royston, we drove there. It was a bit of a tip, with apologies to all of the very nice people who live in the no doubt very nice bits of Royston and its environs, so the viewings were cancelled and we came home.
Now begins the round of looking for somewhere we both like and can afford, while trying to sell our own house in a difficult time to sell, and a house that is large and well-suited to us but not apparently to the taste of the likely purchasers in our area.
We shall see, and we assume there is truth in the view that, if the price is right (i.e. low enough), we shall find a buyer.
But what has that to do with the Romance of the Cup ((c) lazy sports hacks on every back page) in January with its famous transfer window?
Well, we are in the transfer window (can you be in a window, rather than behind it or through it?) when we are trying to buy and, firstly, sell players. We want players that will fit with us, that don't need too much doing to them and which will hold their price. For those we have to sell first, we need to price them right to sell and to convince would-be purchasers that they are right to buy for them and value for money. So not much chnace with many of our 'fringe' players.
Meanwhile we are encountering a cup team that's unfamiliar to us in Barnsley, so we're having a look round it and think what we like about this team and what we don't like (while secretly hoping we never have to play them on a regular basis as we don't want to travel there as it's not a location we like).
One of the criteria for our choice of house location is travelling distance to West Ham, but it's getting less and less of an important criterion as this season progresses. As well as the seeming inevitability of relegation, given the one step forward, two steps back nature of the team's performances, there's the matter of The Pornographers' choice of Manager to inspire, the Vice-Chairman's failure in her task to secure new players already announced (Sidwell) that would have had her fired by Lord Sugar, and the Olympic Stadium that nobody except The Pornographers and Karren B wants.
Still at least we managed to beat Barnsley - just. Which probably means that Avram can postpone his house hunting a little longer. But as Hughton, Allardyce and now Hodgson are all in the market for new clubs, he might be advised to keep his own house on the market. After all, the housing market, unlke the transfer market, will be open after the end of January and if he's still in a job then, he surely won't be after he does what he showed he's good at last year - managing relegation.
My willingness to spend even the much reduced ticket prices to watch our rubbish team struggle and eventually win unconvincingly against a lower division team was non-existant. Had I known the alternative was house-hunting, I might have reconsidered, but it was not to be.
So today was scouting out Saffron Walden and Royston. I rather put the damper on Royston by giving my opinion (based on very limited acquaintance) that it was a bit of a tip. However, Saffron Walden proved to be a hit, so, for the immediate future, the location is sorted. But as The Controller had arranged to view two houses in Royston, we drove there. It was a bit of a tip, with apologies to all of the very nice people who live in the no doubt very nice bits of Royston and its environs, so the viewings were cancelled and we came home.
Now begins the round of looking for somewhere we both like and can afford, while trying to sell our own house in a difficult time to sell, and a house that is large and well-suited to us but not apparently to the taste of the likely purchasers in our area.
We shall see, and we assume there is truth in the view that, if the price is right (i.e. low enough), we shall find a buyer.
But what has that to do with the Romance of the Cup ((c) lazy sports hacks on every back page) in January with its famous transfer window?
Well, we are in the transfer window (can you be in a window, rather than behind it or through it?) when we are trying to buy and, firstly, sell players. We want players that will fit with us, that don't need too much doing to them and which will hold their price. For those we have to sell first, we need to price them right to sell and to convince would-be purchasers that they are right to buy for them and value for money. So not much chnace with many of our 'fringe' players.
Meanwhile we are encountering a cup team that's unfamiliar to us in Barnsley, so we're having a look round it and think what we like about this team and what we don't like (while secretly hoping we never have to play them on a regular basis as we don't want to travel there as it's not a location we like).
One of the criteria for our choice of house location is travelling distance to West Ham, but it's getting less and less of an important criterion as this season progresses. As well as the seeming inevitability of relegation, given the one step forward, two steps back nature of the team's performances, there's the matter of The Pornographers' choice of Manager to inspire, the Vice-Chairman's failure in her task to secure new players already announced (Sidwell) that would have had her fired by Lord Sugar, and the Olympic Stadium that nobody except The Pornographers and Karren B wants.
Still at least we managed to beat Barnsley - just. Which probably means that Avram can postpone his house hunting a little longer. But as Hughton, Allardyce and now Hodgson are all in the market for new clubs, he might be advised to keep his own house on the market. After all, the housing market, unlke the transfer market, will be open after the end of January and if he's still in a job then, he surely won't be after he does what he showed he's good at last year - managing relegation.
Thursday 6 January 2011
Down, down, deeper and down: Newcastle 5-0 West Ham; 5 January
Four games unbeaten and off the bottom of the league, out of the bottom three, Avram confident we've turned the corner and off we go to Newcastle to ... well ... capitulate.
Newcastle's first and second choice strikers were unavailable, so they played the third choice, bought cheaply from Coventry, recently recovered from injury, never scored a Premiership goal, and he scores a hat-trick.
Defending? Not the West Ham way. Not that I've watched it - I can do without train wrecks. I was noting the regular updates at the bottom of the screen as I watched Arsenal play Man City instead.
After half-time and losing 3-0 I flicked to Sky Sports news. The commentator passed the throwaway remark that Avram could take off the lucky scarf now.
There's something deeply atavistic about football people's ludicrous superstitions. The most apparently sane and rational of men - and even Alex Ferguson - seem, on occasions, to regress to the primitive state of actually believing that wearing a particular item of clothing or following a particular routine will somehow have a determining effect on the outcome of a football match involving at least 22 players as well as a referee and his two assistants.
As well as being pathetic, it's understandable in a Pascale's Wager kind of way (not being able to know whether or not God exists, it's best to believe in him because if he doesn't exist you've lost nothing compared to not believing, whereas if he does exist, you gain as opposed to not believing. OK as long as believing doesn't actually require you to do anything but believe). So if you're drowning and there's no life raft or convenient log, clutch at a straw. Or, if you're heading for relegation, wear a lucky scarf.
But it transpired, according to Avram after the game, he wasn't wearing the lucky scarf because he forgot to pack it. This could serve as a metaphor for his (mis)management. Believe, against all the evidence, that something will be beneficial, like wearing a scarf or selecting (even buying) crap players, and then forget to wear said item (or play said crap players you bought).
And to put the final high sheen on the club's professionalism, I read today that the loan transfer of Steve Sidwell has fallen though and he's gone to Wolves (fellow relegation candidates) instead. Apparently, this is because West Ham couldn't conclude the deal unless and until we've shifted some players out, so one of The Pornographers' 15 irons is no longer in the fire. And that was supposed to be a done deal last week. You couldn't make it up.
I couldn't understand why we would want to buy a second rate impersonation of Scott Parker anyway (unless we were going to sell Super Scott and prepare for life in the Championship) but if the club was set on it, the least we could expect would be they would do it.
But then they've cocked everything else up this season, so why not this?
Newcastle's first and second choice strikers were unavailable, so they played the third choice, bought cheaply from Coventry, recently recovered from injury, never scored a Premiership goal, and he scores a hat-trick.
Defending? Not the West Ham way. Not that I've watched it - I can do without train wrecks. I was noting the regular updates at the bottom of the screen as I watched Arsenal play Man City instead.
After half-time and losing 3-0 I flicked to Sky Sports news. The commentator passed the throwaway remark that Avram could take off the lucky scarf now.
There's something deeply atavistic about football people's ludicrous superstitions. The most apparently sane and rational of men - and even Alex Ferguson - seem, on occasions, to regress to the primitive state of actually believing that wearing a particular item of clothing or following a particular routine will somehow have a determining effect on the outcome of a football match involving at least 22 players as well as a referee and his two assistants.
As well as being pathetic, it's understandable in a Pascale's Wager kind of way (not being able to know whether or not God exists, it's best to believe in him because if he doesn't exist you've lost nothing compared to not believing, whereas if he does exist, you gain as opposed to not believing. OK as long as believing doesn't actually require you to do anything but believe). So if you're drowning and there's no life raft or convenient log, clutch at a straw. Or, if you're heading for relegation, wear a lucky scarf.
But it transpired, according to Avram after the game, he wasn't wearing the lucky scarf because he forgot to pack it. This could serve as a metaphor for his (mis)management. Believe, against all the evidence, that something will be beneficial, like wearing a scarf or selecting (even buying) crap players, and then forget to wear said item (or play said crap players you bought).
And to put the final high sheen on the club's professionalism, I read today that the loan transfer of Steve Sidwell has fallen though and he's gone to Wolves (fellow relegation candidates) instead. Apparently, this is because West Ham couldn't conclude the deal unless and until we've shifted some players out, so one of The Pornographers' 15 irons is no longer in the fire. And that was supposed to be a done deal last week. You couldn't make it up.
I couldn't understand why we would want to buy a second rate impersonation of Scott Parker anyway (unless we were going to sell Super Scott and prepare for life in the Championship) but if the club was set on it, the least we could expect would be they would do it.
But then they've cocked everything else up this season, so why not this?
Monday 3 January 2011
A Happy New Year? West Ham 2 - 0 Wolves; 1 January
Although West Ham went into this game on a relatively good run of form (unbeaten for three games, and, more tellingly coming from behind on two occasions - once to win and once to draw) we were still bottom of the league. And although we'd had a good Christmas period, Wolves had gone to Anfield and won. And although we all know that Liverpool is a team in crisis/transition/development (delete according to taste), we haven't managed a win there for half a century.
Our 'strengthening' for the Christmas period had included recalling Freddie Sears from a loan spell at Scunthorpe where he'd scored precisely no goals, to follow his equally unproductive loan spells at Crystal Palace and Coventry. He had played tidily on the right of midfield, keeping out Barrera (one of Avram's big summer signings who can't get in the team), but for this game Cole started and Obinna was on the bench, along with Mark Noble (whoa-oa-oa-oa). No sign again of the elusive Dyer (perhaps as well as the rumours of only training when he wishes, he only features in a match day squad when he wishes), and Ben Haim and Gabbidon returned as fullbacks.
But, as ever, there was Super Scott to drive the team on and it definitely needed driving. Wolves looked poor and so did we. When Cole gave the boo-boys their first half licence by missing when through on goal, it looked like being one of those days. But, just as against Everton, own goal scored for us (he's got more in the league that Obinna and Barrera together). And perfectly comical it was, unless your are a Wolves fan. Freddie Sears put a cross on a plate for Cole that all he had to do was touch and he'd scored. So he missed completely, thus fooling Zubar who was behind him, into bouncing the ball off his shin into the net. A goal greeted with delirious laughter. Thereafter son Jack urged West Ham to pass to Zubar when near the area, since he looked more threatening than Cole or Piquionne (who was also back to his cow's arse and banjo impersonations).
The og had come after Wolves had threatened to score a couple of times at the other end only to be denied by Robert Green back to his best. They were somewhat deflated by the goal, but came back pretty strongly unitl Freedie Sears scored. A second goal for us after two and a half years! There's a rhyme there somewhere. He coolly passed the ball into the net after Ben Haim played a peach of a cross exactly where Sears had asked for it. And although Wolves hit the bar and missed chances it looked easier to score, we were home and hosed and up to the giddy heights of 15th.
Not that we're secure there with the teams below having games in hand, but still better than being in the bottom three.
Now The Pornographers are promising to strengthen the team in the newly opened transfer window. It's still a bit too cold to have the window open for me, but The Pornographers claim to have fifteen irons in the fire. I don't know if this is some new range of dildos they're marketing, a witty play on the team's nickname, or a further dollop of the owner bullshit to make the supporters feel better (but I can guess), but they're promising three new arrivals.
Interestingly, two rumoured players are forwards from the German and French leagues who have as poor a scoring record as our present forwards. Still, since one of them rejoices in the first name of Dieumerci which my schoolboy French translates as Thank God, perhaps he'll be the answer to our prayers. We do need a saviour and King Carlos seems to be otherwise engaged.
But - new year, new hope. Out of the relegation places. In the quarter final of the Fizzypop Cup against a team that currently can't win at all. Playing a lower division team in the proper Cup. Away this week at Newcastle managed by our own Alan Pardew, and who have their leading goalscorer injured.
What could possibly go wrong??
Our 'strengthening' for the Christmas period had included recalling Freddie Sears from a loan spell at Scunthorpe where he'd scored precisely no goals, to follow his equally unproductive loan spells at Crystal Palace and Coventry. He had played tidily on the right of midfield, keeping out Barrera (one of Avram's big summer signings who can't get in the team), but for this game Cole started and Obinna was on the bench, along with Mark Noble (whoa-oa-oa-oa). No sign again of the elusive Dyer (perhaps as well as the rumours of only training when he wishes, he only features in a match day squad when he wishes), and Ben Haim and Gabbidon returned as fullbacks.
But, as ever, there was Super Scott to drive the team on and it definitely needed driving. Wolves looked poor and so did we. When Cole gave the boo-boys their first half licence by missing when through on goal, it looked like being one of those days. But, just as against Everton, own goal scored for us (he's got more in the league that Obinna and Barrera together). And perfectly comical it was, unless your are a Wolves fan. Freddie Sears put a cross on a plate for Cole that all he had to do was touch and he'd scored. So he missed completely, thus fooling Zubar who was behind him, into bouncing the ball off his shin into the net. A goal greeted with delirious laughter. Thereafter son Jack urged West Ham to pass to Zubar when near the area, since he looked more threatening than Cole or Piquionne (who was also back to his cow's arse and banjo impersonations).
The og had come after Wolves had threatened to score a couple of times at the other end only to be denied by Robert Green back to his best. They were somewhat deflated by the goal, but came back pretty strongly unitl Freedie Sears scored. A second goal for us after two and a half years! There's a rhyme there somewhere. He coolly passed the ball into the net after Ben Haim played a peach of a cross exactly where Sears had asked for it. And although Wolves hit the bar and missed chances it looked easier to score, we were home and hosed and up to the giddy heights of 15th.
Not that we're secure there with the teams below having games in hand, but still better than being in the bottom three.
Now The Pornographers are promising to strengthen the team in the newly opened transfer window. It's still a bit too cold to have the window open for me, but The Pornographers claim to have fifteen irons in the fire. I don't know if this is some new range of dildos they're marketing, a witty play on the team's nickname, or a further dollop of the owner bullshit to make the supporters feel better (but I can guess), but they're promising three new arrivals.
Interestingly, two rumoured players are forwards from the German and French leagues who have as poor a scoring record as our present forwards. Still, since one of them rejoices in the first name of Dieumerci which my schoolboy French translates as Thank God, perhaps he'll be the answer to our prayers. We do need a saviour and King Carlos seems to be otherwise engaged.
But - new year, new hope. Out of the relegation places. In the quarter final of the Fizzypop Cup against a team that currently can't win at all. Playing a lower division team in the proper Cup. Away this week at Newcastle managed by our own Alan Pardew, and who have their leading goalscorer injured.
What could possibly go wrong??
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