After time to reflect and having watched back the highlights on Match of the Day, I think it is fair to say that ours was the best performance of the day. That result away to Villa, with so many players out injured, was remarkable in itself, but the result was in fact earned, it was not as fortunate as I called it immediately after the game.
Let's be honest, Green didn't have that much to do at the end of the day did he? Now, to be fair, that is in part down to the profligacy of Barry, Heskey and Carew, all of whom should have done better from clear cut chances - goals are pretty big things and really international players should at least force a save when given a chance in the penalty box, never mind from on the edge of the six yard box (Barry) and especially from inside it (Carew)!
But we were not without our own chances. Stanislas did force a save after bursting through brilliantly and had Tomkins squared to Stanislas later, instead of scooping the ball over, I am sure Junior would have been celebrating his second senior goal. LBM flirted with the idea of scoring, Noble's deflected effort was tipped over and we played pin ball in the Villa goalmouth after Di Michele burst through. And actually Tristan did get a deliberate deflection on his header after all.
That is impressive against the fifth placed team in the Premiership. I know that position may flatter Villa but they have accumulated enough points to be there and they are something of a bogey team for West Ham.
Some will argue that Chelsea overcoming Arsenal to reach the FA Cup Final qualifies for performance of the day but that was on the back of two poor goalkeeping mistakes by their stand in Pole. For me, a virtual reserve team trading blows with Villa and coming away with a point, was the more impressive. In fact, that penalty claim apart, we were much the better team after that equalising goal. It makes you wonder what we could achieve with a forward or two worth the name!
6 comments:
villa where all over you - match of the day must have been edited by an iron..... you where very lucky and where dominated for a large majority of the match. villa just cant score all these chances they make...
west ham were all over villa at the beginning until the goal which was down to the back line getting confused about positions as it was a makeshift backline. up until then villa had not had more than 20 SECONDS in possession. Villa then seemed to dominate but couldn't finish and also couldn't defend on the break. west ham then gradually got into their stride more and more in the second half but also wasted some very good half and full chances. i thought the result was a fair one but i have to say the ref was very very poor and carded people for nothing and then let dangerous tackles of which there were few go mostly unpunished. consistantly bad or good people will suffer from a ref but inconsistancy is the the territory of my wife's gravy only. overall considering west ham played mostly their kids and had 5 first choice players missing and collins limp off during the game, they did extremely well against a team that have earned their 5th place in the league.
FAL - I have said that I don't mind you putting up your link at the end of your posts but if you persist with the "selling" for selling's sake, adding nothing to the debate in the process, I will delete your posts. I think that is fair. If you wish to advertise your site on here, I am sure we can come to an arrangement.
Celtic's comment has been carried as a main article. Thanks mate. Glad you had such a great day out!
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