Saturday 19 October 2013

Allardichi 1 Pellegridyce 3 - But no disgrace in that.

Ok we lost and, if we are honest, we lost pretty heavily, but Man City were pretty bloody good and, our centre backs apart, we were decent. And to be fair to Tomkins and Reid, they were horribly exposed by Man City's quick passing football and excellent movement. Last game, Big Sam thought he was the dog's bollocks, now he understands that his claims to have revolutionised football with his 4-6-0 formation were pure bollocks.

First the goals. Agüero's opener was a bit tasty. True the ball travelled far too far through the middle of our midfield and defence, but the dummy by Negredo was breath-taking. The ball went so close to him that his decision to simply ignore it would have bemused Moore and Beckenbauer, never mind Tomkins and Reid. Agüero's run was perfectly timed and Reid was still on New Zealand time as the Argentinian ran in on Jussi and buried the chance superbly.

The second goal was not so easy to excuse. Reid was drawn out wide and was done all ends up by Negredo, who was then sandwiched as Demel joined the Kiwi in trying to close out the threat. The result was yet another stupid free kick conceded in a dangerous area. Over came the free kick and the only surprise was just how much space Agüero had on the edge of the six yard box as he rose to head home. Who was marking him? Nolan I think, but the entire West Ham team stood and watched as he scored - Jussi apart who valiantly tried to deflect the ball over and wide, simply pushing it into the top corner.

And that was that, we thought. It was now just a question of how many. And then up popped Vaz Te, who had been largely anonymous until then, with a deft overhead kick into the bottom corner. There were suspicions of offside in the build up - and I think Diame was off before  he crossed - but who cares. 1-2 and game on!

Briefly, very briefly, Man City creaked, but as we pushed forward, more and more gaps appeared in the middle of the park, and Jussi made save after save. So when the third City goal came, it was no surprise. Agüero ran at the heart of the defence, Reid missed the opportunity to put in a tackle, Tomkins prevented him getting in a shot but the ball was pulled back to Silva, whose finish was sublime. 1-3. Job done for Pellegridyce's men!

And the bits in between? Well Noble was superb, putting in three fantastic tackles and recycling the ball superbly. Diame ran around a lot but looked uncomfortable in the formation much of the time. Nolan did ok, but he is wasted sitting deep and when he moved forward, he hardly got a sniff of the ball apart from deflecting wide after Hart had saved from Diame. Morrison was ordinary and received a timely reality check. Vaz Te was largely anonymous apart from his goal but the decision to withdraw him was still odd after he had scored. Downing was decent but never devastating.

Sadly, defensively, we were poor. Demel did well until he went off injured but O'Brien was far too easily bypassed after he came on. Boomtown was poor. And Tomkins and Reid had their worst games for some considerable time. Jussi, however, was excellent.

But let's not be too glum. Sunderland were thumped. So were Norwich and Cardiff. Palace will go down. So even without Carroll, we should have enough to stay up. Shouldn't we?

Player ratings: Jussi 10; Demel 7, Tomkins 4, Reid 3, Rat 4; Nolan 5 Noble 9; Morrison 5, Diame 6, Vaz Te 5, Downing 6  Subs: O'Brien 3, Jarvis 6, Petric (not on long enough to rate).



14 comments:

fred149 said...

Jarvis should get a 3 for being put on. Vaz Te's movement is better than anyone else in our teams and to take him for jarvis stopped us ever having the chance to equalise.

Anonymous said...

Jussi can not get 10 out of 10 when 3 has gone past him! Ur crap at rating ur "team" especially from ur armchair!

Hammer52 said...

I thought we did well against a really rich team full of super stars.My only problem is with our crowd one complete twat who ran on the pitch & those of you who poured out when the third went in not good support at all.

Anonymous said...

Jarvis was pants downing looked bloody good at times but towards the end some people thought they were pele .we'll be alright :-)

Anonymous said...

The man running on was probably the best move of the match :-) well the best tackle by that security guard anyway .have to say we should leave the fire drill to the spuds !

Anonymous said...

Kevin in manchester writes...

Decent summary. Thought we played with a certain amount of vim and vigour but honestly when top teams are on their game there's little chance of getting a result.for all those who condemn sam for being one dimensional and a long ball merchant, the ball hardly left the turf. Now we have proved we can do the false nine thing. .. perhaps we can mix it up a bit...a few crosses in the second half with City defence beat but none of our players had the motor to meet them may be different when Carroll gets back. I think we will do all right this season about a half dozen teams nowhere near as good as us .

Anonymous said...

Hope it's dawned on you by now HF that the Spurs result was a flash in the pan.
We all know you pretty well and when you talk relegation you don't really mean it and when you talk survival, you are really worrying.
I support Leeds United so I didn't have much to look forward to on Saturday however knowing you are feeling bad makes me smile. So you do serve a purpose after all!

Anonymous said...

Looks like our latest loan signing Ravel Morrison is going to be unveiled after the game today. It's a shame you miserable sods wouldn't release him on Friday like we requested though as we could have used him today.

Great result for your lot yesterday by the way.....

Anonymous said...

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha u bunch of raving irons!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

"Kevin in Manchester' don't make me laugh,as if you'll support wet spam from there! Trying to make out you're some sort of big club! Haha

Revolver said...

More and more I keep reading/hearing that we should be good enough to stay up as there are teams far worse than us. Is staying up now the extent of our ambition? What happened to pushing on from or at least matching our 10th place finish last season?

And another thing. It seems we are excusing the Man City result because they are brilliant and have a team of superstars. Prior to playing us their 3 away games in the Premier were 2-3 defeats against Cardiff and Villa and 0-0 against Stoke.

If that's brilliant then I dread to think what's crap!

Hammersfan said...

I take your point Revolver but I think we caught Man City on a good day - and when they are good, they are very, very, very good.

As for our ambition, I would gladly take 4th from bottom at the moment. We have backed ourselves into a blind alley by putting all our money in the Andy Carroll basket.

Hammersfan said...

Or eggs even! Mixing metaphors alarmingly there!

Anonymous said...

West ham shud b ashames setting up against opposition in the same league without a striker 11 men behind the ball rangers took sum rite stick wen they playef this way against man u wham play this way every week they deserve t go down cos of it at least the other small clubs in the div giv it ago I really hope they get wot negative tactics deserve a negat outcome relegation