That's it. Today was an absolute disgrace. Burnley outfought us and outplayed us for 65 minutes of the match. For the first fifteen minutes, we hardly touched the bloody ball. We needed to put them on the back foot early doors, but instead, despite going 4-4-2, Zola went into the match with a safety first team, packing his midfield with grafters with no thought as to how we were going to create any openings. The fact that Ilan was his third choice of the new strikers, and promptly scored, says it all. Zola does not know his arse from his bloody elbow.
Everything tactically is wrong. Fair enough he wanted to reward Spector for two good performances, but by teaming the Wank with Collison on the left, he again set up without a left footer in the team. How were we going to progess down the left flank on that basis exactly? Meanwhile Behrami, Parker and Noble in the centre offered lots of huff and puff but no creativity whatsoever. Parker gets the ball and runs until he loses it. Behrami gets the ball and runs until he is fouled or falls over. Noble gets the ball and plays long aimless balls forward. Our ONLY creative option for most of the game was Faubert, a natural wide player playing on the CORRECT flank! Stanislas came on and offered width on the left but EVERY time, he came inside onto his right foot, losing all momentum from the attack because he does not trust himself to cross with his left. I don't like the strategy at the best of times, but without a LEFT FOOTED LEFT BACK OVERLAPPING ON THE OUTSIDE, it is absolutely absurd. But Zola knows best, Zola plays Spector on the left even though he has Ilunga on the bench. That is stupid. That is the only word for it, STUPID. Not naive, STUPID!
Today Zola went head to head with Brian Laws and Brian Laws outwitted him. How embarrassing is that? Laws wouldn't have been able to get near Zola on the pitch, but in the dressing room he is the better man: he picked the right team, employed the right tactics and motivated his team to play from the off, rather than wait for 60 minutes to tick by first. Tell me, why were we obviously more urgent AFTER Ilan's goal? Where was that passion, determination and drive in the first half? Tell me, why was Ilan the last throw of the dice rather than the first? Tell me, where was Diamanti? Tell me, why hasn't Stanislas even been tried on the right? And tell me, with Faubert looking impressive, why wasn't Ilunga sent on, Spector moved to right back and Faubert pushed forward with instructions to play high and whip in crosses? Tell me, why did it take Zola SO LONG to make a change? Tell me, why did we have to go two goals down before we saw Stanislas as a more attacking option?
We are back in the bottom three and after the next two ABSOLUTELY MUST WIN home games, we face away trips to Arsenal, Chelsea and Man Utd. It is looking bleak, very bleak, with seven points surrendereed in the last three games. Tell me, why were Cole and Parker left out against Blackburn?
Hull City beat Unreal City today, playing with a team inferior in natural talent to our own. But Phil Brown is a motivator and cuts his suit according to his cloth. Zola is a dreamer and a complete jester tactically. We played like we had a right to win the game today, not as if we had to battle to win it. That is down to poor management. It is time for Zola to be shown the door.
43 comments:
Big mistake is that they were desperately looking for attackers when our real problem was the wings. Totally agree about the right wing being a black hole for us. There is also the left wing which is there to be exploited by better teams than Burnley. I don't think Zola and co. get it. Also, I would have started with Ilan in the team. The guy seems a natural smelling a goal and being in the right places at the right time. This is a game we should have never lost. And we lost it on mistakes and bad (or should I say terrible) tactics. Yes, we were unlucky not to get at least a draw but this can be no excuse. Good teams make their own luck. Our passes were wasteful from midfield and we were not into this game the way Burnley were from the outset. I think that the unthinkable has happenned today. We allowed the worst team in the Premier league to dictate the game and win three points at our expense. One more game like this and I see Zola walking. Perhaps he should because we have no room for more tactical errors.
Right, lets not get too panicky yet guys. Was happy with what I saw nearer the end. Let's hope Zola recognises this for the next game. Some new personal and change in formation will take a bit of bedding in.
Unlucky with Stan and Mido hitting the woodwork. Should have started with Diamanti. Zola is showing too much favouritism with the four midfielders he started with.
We played so well when noble went off. Upson showed why he is overrated and Tomkins was at his running-in-sand best (worst). Why does every team's players look more clever and sharper than ours?
Same excellent balls in by Faubert. Best player, two games in row.
You must have watched a different game to me.
We dominated possession, hit the post, hit the bar, had one cleared off the line, disallowed offside goal and forced their keeper into some great saves.
Burnley had 2 chances..
Announcers said Diamanti had a knee injury at the beginning of the match.. obviously don't know the validity of the statement. Clearly we should have worked harder to get a player like David Bentley. He may be a complete sod but at least he has pace and the ability to cross a decent ball. I want to see stanislas on the right and diamanti on the left, both on their natural foot side. We need to be whipping in crosses between the 18 and 6 yard box, too many wasted chances went straight to Jensens hands.
you are an idiot, yeah so we lose to burnley away , who have beaten man utd , chelsea and other hard teams at home and you want to sack the manager, jesus , i sometimes wonder what kind of morons support my club, well congratulations you have confirmed my worst fears...... tool
Stani Army you just said it "lets hope Zola recognises this for the next game" I have said that since we lost at home to spurs at start of season ! Yes it is time to be panicky ! He is too negative so i think we have to beat Birmingham or its bye bye Zola. Rob season ticket holder 30 years.
Sorry i thought Chelsea beat Burnley last week so i guess you are the idiot !!!!
17:52 is spot on, the rest of you clearly don't know your mouth from your arse when it comes to football. Suggesting Parker 'runs with the ball until he loses it'! This is when we regularly are at our most dangerous with his runs drawing in numerous opposition defenders and more often than not he slips a decent pass in, a la McCarthy today. Often it is the player who receives the pass who takes the sting out what Parker does.
West Ham started poorly today but dominated the last fifteen minutes of the first half and pretty much the whole of the second. Their first goal came from a long ball, Upson's fault yes and the second was a sloppy decision by Collison and they capitalised on Green's inefficiency at free-kicks.
Other than this Tomkins who you criticised had a very decent game, I'm guessing you are suggesting he is slow but I only saw him outpaced once today and that was by Burnley's fastest player and we had a covering defender.
Great signs from Mido, his link up play was very good and Ilan looks decent in and around the box but you can't go suggesting he deserves a start after just 10/15 minutes of game-time.
You suggest Zola went to pack the midfield, yet he left out Kovac (his most defensive midfielder), if you look at the four who played (I would say our strongest midfield on their day) they can all be considered ball players and hopefully Zola can name all 4 of them in the next game (the first time we will have been able to do this for a while).
A very naive and overly-critical article, you should be getting behind the side at a time like this! Shame on you. We were unlucky today and deserved at least a point from the game. Looking forward to the next game where we can hopefully see further improvement and some better link-up between the midfield and the strikers like in the second half.
Not one mention on how Upson shat the bed on the first goal.
He got beat in the Arsenal game, and in this one, we lost both games by one goal. SELL HIM!
We hit the woodwork twice, Mido was mugged in the box(shirt pulling),
have a goal disallowed, and you say sack Zola!?
Give me a break...
COME ON YOU IRONS!!!
this team is just not good enough. i cant see us staying up 2 be honest. we just dont know how 2 win. i feel gutted.
Anonymous 18:06,
But I think now he has the players so he has no excuse where-as before, he didn't. That's why I think we need to wait and see a bit. If Zola fails now, then there is no mitigating factor.
What I would say is that he hasn't shown a track record of learning quick though, particularly when it comes to favouritism. Noble should have been out of the team a long long while back. I said last week that as soon as we go to 4 in midfield, he will be exposed. It was the case.
This has to be our midfield:
Stan, Parker, Behrami, Diaminti.
Can swap the two wingers over, now that we have two target men in the middle to aim for.
...or Diamanti...even though Diaminti sounds refreshing :)
1816, I agree the only way is down, the situation is hopeless. Championship here we come.
Tell me, if we are so talented and Zola is so good, why are we second from bottom? Bit of a paradox that isn't it? Get your head out of your arses. All season we were saying we were too good to go down under Roeder, an inexperienced manager who did not know how to balance his team. This season is fast becoming a carbon copy! The two Davids had better start dusting off Plan B, "If we are relegated." Sell the ground and move in with Leyton Orient?
Burnley had 2 chances and they scored on both of them. A lose is a lose at this stage of the season, no matter how well we played. I like Zola, but he could very well end up getting us relegated, nice guy that he his. I don't think he's had a clue this season how to manage the players and now that we have six strikers on the books he's starting to run out of excuses.
What I find amazing about West Ham fans is how they always see the positives. Even when we are the edfe of the cliff, losing a game to worst team in the League and being seriously threatened with relegation. We always see the positives. There are no excuses for losing this game. Zola has proven time and again he can't get a winning team together. Whether it is his failure to instill the right motivation in the team and make fight as if their life depended on it or whether he persists with players who have repeatedly failed it is his fault and we do not have the luxury to keep giving him more chances. I am afraid it may be already to late. Let's get someone in who can fix this team up and win a few games before we start playing with the top four teams away from home!
After reading your blog posts this season I've come to the conclusion you don't really know a lot about football and are one of those people that just moan because you like to go with the crowd and not have a opinion to call your own.
I'd be ashamed to call myself a West Ham fan if my opinions matched yours.
I actually can't be bothered to type any more and will delete this blog from my RSS feed immediately.
if the team cant turn up 4 the first 65 minutes of a game of this importance what chance have we got. this players are a disgrace. they dont deserve 2 be paid.
1833, the one thing I can't be accused of is running with the majority!
Hammersfan if you look at the majority of the posts I think you will find you are indeed running with the majority, certainly in this instance anyway. Stop spreading doom and gloom, everyone is are aware of the situation we are in but we need to get behind the team again and turn Upton Park into a fortress again like it has been in the past! Come on you Irons!
Whether people like it or not Zola is already gone.
If I was Sullivan and I had just invested 50million into a club that could go down I would do EVERYTHING I could to keep the club up.
If giving the manager funds to buy strikers failed then I would look at the manager and wonder if another would make an instant impact.
I would try EVERYTHING or otherwise kiss goodbye to my 50mil.
Kinda agree with you, like it or not I just don't think Zola is a Premiership quality manager. Clake's veiled comments just before Xmas confirmed what he thinks too..
I'm not a believer in chopping and changing managers every 5 minutes, but I really think we're flogging a dead horse with Zola now. All the same comments after each disappointing result, and all the same tactics used for the following match!
As was the case with Roeder, I just don't think he's tough enough (tactics aside).
Cat amongst the pigeons here, but personally I'd go for McLeish.
Fanno, Fanno, Fanno....
Couple of points spring to mind.
When we had Curbs, you said that you would happily swap him for a manager that plays attractive football, even if we lost every game 4-3... The football is there, the goals are there; Be careful what you wish for?
Secondly, wasn't this exactly the same midfield that went toe to toe with Man U at home last season? (I can't remember exactly, but I'm pretty sure it was).
As you know from our previous Curbs' debates, I will pretty much always back our manager. I say give him some time.
We have gone through some serious shit in the last couple of years. Just look at Pompey's situation, we were not far off from going through that ourselves.
Now that we have some stability, let's see how we progress from this stage. This was our first game with the new strikers. They'll need some time to bed in, but given their experience, I'm sure they will soon.
As for preferring Ilan to Mido? Why, because he scored? He had other half chances after that he didn't score with from what I saw.
Going back to our midfield. I think that Zola is trying to balance between the best players and the best players for the positions in question. Very similar to the England midfield over the last decade. Trying to squeeze in Gerrard and Lampard, and previously players like Scholes etc, with no quality left sided midfielder.
Disappointing game. I was very annoyed to see us play the way we did. It was unfortunate for McCarthy not to score..but I have to say, once again, Parker was our best player. Mido didn't do so bad, and it's good to see Ilan do well with that goal and helping Mido out before he hit the post. Illunga should have started and Faubert should have started in the right wing with Spector in right back. I can't imagine Zola putting two right footed players in the left flank..it makes no sense. I can imagine having Collison play on the left and break into the penalty area while Illunga crosses it in with his strong foot or something. (Just an example). Zola is a tactical numpty..it's not being naive, but it's just the absence of common logic. Come on you Irons. I personally miss Franco
Apache,
The trouble is, the football isn't entertaining. How many shots did we muster against Blackburn and Pompey exactly? Zola plays without width. That is not the West Ham way. He plays "Italian football" and our players are not good enough to do it.
People keep making excuses for him. We are going down if we don't improve fast.
Hes gone in the morning
I'm kind of wondering how many of these posts came from fans who've watched the match today. To describe Burnley as the worst team in the PREM is a bit of an insult when the Hammers were so poor for the best part of 70 minutes. Take Cole and Parker out and there's very little left - that's an observation not a wind up.
A fair point sadly.
if zola stays we go down,bring in hughes and give this team some ticker.
New owners won't waste time - Zola could be gone before the end of Feb.
The threat of relegation has really kicked in for me, and with the big four still to come away the players should be playing out their skin from here onwards, will they? will they heck!. Zola should be given two games to prove himself. Must admit we were very unlucly today but we shouldn't be left to rue those chances. HF I agree with most of your post aside from bringing on Ilan, I don't think any of us were to know that he would get a debut goal, and i think we all pretty much had/has him down as the third 'best' out of our three signings (none of which included a defender)
Lets just face facts the players are not good enough for the premier league and show no passion for the club we all love. Zola and Clarke are tactically naive. sad to say it looks like we are gone if we continue to put on performances like this people keep raving about Carlton miss control but take a step back and look at him he is not that good? he would be OK in the championship but not in the premier league! if he was we would of lost him in the transfer window injured or not we should of made it a priority to get a creative midfielder in also it's OK having a shed load of forwards but if you cannot get it to them you stand no chance? lets continue to get behind the team and pray for some divine intervention come on you Irons
hammers fan .... you aint moving in with us .. clear offfff
Do most of u even watch the game?!? Or just see the score and slate us down. We dominated for 60 mins of that game chance after chance. And it werent bcoz we arent good enough to finsh bt bcoz we was just purely unlucky. They scored an amazing free kick that we replicated and hit the bar. And a lucky long ball. Even at the end we was going all guns and hit the post with ilan gettin hes studs caught in the ground for the rebound. So i dnt understand how people are saying they dnt fite for the club. HOWEVER i agree on zola and some tactics....mainly noble and collison who i believe have been extremely poor most of the season. Stanislas MUST start nxt game and if diamanti isnt fit then push faubert to right wing and spector at rite bk. Rant over thnk u
We're not Chelsea or Arsenal. We can't play continental football in the EPL - we don't have the players for it. Go more direct, get the ball wide and put some crosses in to those big lumps we have up front. It might be too late now but as least we can go down fighting. People seem to be blaming Upson for the first goal he made a mistake but Green should have seen it out.
Watching the game yesterday, I saw one team playing as a team, and that was Burnley. West Ham were like 11 individuals who did not know what each other were doing, we have been like that for several games now. It seems that we only start playing when the game are already lost.
Couldn't have said it better Hammersfan. I can't add anything. Yes, to those who think not, i watched the game. Yes, to those who think not, i know a lot about football. We didn't dominate nothing & waited till two goals down before we got any sense of urgency at all. Yeah, that's right, let's be positive. Great game fellas. Don't worry about the points, just go out & enjoy yourselves. Let's wait till five or six games left & get Brooking in. No worries, seen it all before. Short memories. Get the stick out Mr.Sullivan or start sacking people.
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Let's show him how we think he's getting on -
Is it time for Zola to go?
Did we really look awful yesterday?
or did we have lots possession, hit the post and hit the bar, had one amazilingly cleared off the line, a disallowed offside goal and forced their keeper into making some fine saves?
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Spot on Winston, 1117 and 1217. I called the first goal a joint mistake by Upson and Green. there should not be a no man's land between them like that for a player as limited as Nugent to run into. Green's positioning was poor too.
Shit blog
WOW cant believe how much shite you actually speak, you seem to think you are a tactical geneis compared to Zola why dont you be the manager? or you can fuck off back to north london im sure your fit in nicely with the scum, instead of attaching yourself to our club like a leech and pissing off all the real supporters.
Glad you are happy with a win ratio of 27.5% under Zola.
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