Squad competition is fierce, says Kemp ahead of Spurs
WHUFC.com
West Ham United winger Dan Kemp says the competition amongst the attacking players in the Premier League 2 squad is fierce ahead of the side's London derby against Tottenham Hotspur on Monday. Academy Director and manager of the team Terry Westley has the likes of Sead Haksabanovic, Martin Samuelsen, Nathan Holland, Grady Diangana and Joe Powell – as well as Kemp – currently fit to choose from. A trio of new signing Haksabanovic, Norway international Samuelsen and former Everton man Holland started behind Toni Martinez in attack against Swindon Town last week, and the Hammers were devastating going forward, scoring three times to beat the League Two outfit. And Kemp – who scored the winner from the bench in the 3-2 win at the County Ground – insisted the competition for places in the starting XI is healthy. "We're all pushing each other on every day," said the England U19 international. "There is loads of competition but my job is to keep doing the best I can in training and in games and to make sure that I am starting. "It's definitely healthy to have that though. As long as you're strong minded, and not mentally weak, it's good. You've got to really believe you deserve to be in the team.
"Obviously we're all good friends as well but ultimately it comes down to pushing each other on, congratulating each other but knowing you want to start and adding pressure onto yourself to do that. "So everyone is really looking forward to Spurs. We beat them in pre-season and although that's only a friendly, it builds confidence. We'll go into the game positively and with loads of confidence from that and from Tuesday." The clash at Spurs' Enfield training centre will be the first of three competitive meetings this season, with the London rivals having been drawn together in the Premier League International Cup. West Ham were 3-2 winners in the pre-season meeting just a couple of weeks ago, and with that in mind as well as Tuesday's victory of the same scoreline, Kemp is in high spirits.
"I'm personally really confident at the moment too. On Tuesday, it was great to come into the game and straight away do a few good dribbles and then score pretty quickly after that. To score the winner was brilliant, and it was a great feeling to run over to the fans! "Obviously I'm an attacking player and I want to score, that's my job, so I feel like I did it the other night and it's just even more helpful that it's given us the three points. "These games are good for us to show people what we can do. Obviously to score the winner is special for me personally, but it was a good competitive game and it means a lot. "Hopefully we can do the same again at Tottenham and get the win."
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Cresswell proud of West Ham United's character despite defeat
WHUFC.com
Aaron Cresswell has hailed the excellent character shown by West Ham United in the battling defeat at Southampton. It took a late and debatable penalty for the Saints to best the Hammers on Saturday, having secured an early and seemingly unassailable advantage in the first half. The south coast side had stormed into a 2-0 lead through Marco Gabbiadini and Dusan Tadic, while West Ham United had Marko Arnautovic sent off, but still Slaven Bilic's side battled for a result. It seemed like the Irons' hard work and determination had paid off as Chicharito scored twice with terrific prowess either side of half-time to draw West Ham United level. But a draw was not meant to be as Charlie Austin tucked away a spot-kick in stoppage time to give the Saints the victory. Despite the loss Cresswell believes there is cause for optimism in the performance and is delighted with the character West Ham United showed in battling back from 2-0 down. "I would say we showed great character," Cresswell said: "We were 2-0 down and we had gone down to ten men and then we came back into the game. I think we fully deserved it, the way we reacted to the decisions that went against us in the game. "I think it's great character from us but it's really disappointing to lose."
The left-back enjoyed a decent outing, creating four chances for his teammates and playing the crucial cross that led to Javier Hernandez's second goal. Cresswell was keen to stress the hard work West Ham United had done over the week following the loss to Manchester United, and feels that commitment was also seen in the match at St Mary's. The defender is now keen to look forward to this week's matches with Cheltenham Town and Newcastle United. "To be fair we had worked hard all week in the build-up to the game. Some of the decisions were harsh. You look at it from our point our view. We'd worked our backsides off for sixty minutes," Cresswell added. "There's optimism. We're feeling down now with the defeat but we've got to work hard and get ready for Cheltenham and Newcastle."
The Hammers could welcome back playmaker Manuel Lanzini for the match with Newcastle at the weekend and Cresswell is eager to see the Argentinian back in the team. "He was arguably our best player next season so of course he's been a big miss for us," Cresswell added: "We'll welcome him back but we've got to work on the things we do wrong and put them right."
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Loan watch: Frustration continues for Bolton pair
WHUFC.com
Josh Cullen and Reece Burke started for Bolton Wanderers on Saturday, both completing 90 minutes though the Trotters were beaten 2-1 by Derby County.
The Hammers pair, who have both featured in all three of the side's Championship matches so far this campaign, could not help Phil Parkinson's men to a point against the Rams. Gary Rowett's visiting men raced into an early lead when Dave Nugent scored from close range just eight minutes in. And things went from bad to worse for the hosts less than a quarter of an hour later when the former England international grabbed his second of the afternoon at the Macron Stadium, heading home Johnny Russell's cross. Bolton steadied the ship from then on in, and did halve the deficit in injury time when Gary Madine pounced, but it was too little too late for Cullen and Burke's side who slipped into the bottom three in England's second tier after the defeat. Bolton host Sheffield Wednesday on Tuesday in the Carabao Cup second round.
Meanwhile, Reece Oxford recovered from an ankle injury in time to be named on the bench in Borussia Monchengladbach's opening Bundesliga match and derby win over FC Koln on Sunday. The hosts were dominant throughout and scored the game's only goal four minutes after half time, when right-back Nico Elvedi bagged his first in Borussia colours, converting Ibrahima Traore's cross. Oxford's men are next in action on Saturday when they travel to Augsburg in the Bundesliga.
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Ogbonna: Chicharito is really important for us
WHUFC.com
Angelo Ogbonna has expressed his admiration for Chicharito after West Ham United's courageous 3-2 Premier League defeat at Southampton. The Hammers were reduced to ten men and fell 2-0 down at St Mary's Stadium before roaring back into the game courtesy of two goals from the Mexico striker. However, a controversial late penalty denied Ogbonna and company a point and left them bottom of the table after two matches. "At the end it was so disappointing, but I am also very proud of the team because we played really good with ten men," said the Italian, who was drafted into the starting XI just moments before kick-off after Winston Reid suffered a calf injury in the warm-up. "It was a huge effort. We showed our character out there. We wanted to do better than last week when we played away at Manchester United and conceded four goals. We said we cannot give up this game and we have to show that we are not lazy on the pitch. "We wanted to do our best even though we were playing away and show that this is a new season and at the end, we just thought 'Oh my God'. We didn't expect that."
While the Hammers lamented their luck on the south coast, there were plenty of reasons to be optimistic ahead of Saturday's trip to winless Newcastle United.
Chicharito was outstanding and scored two trademark goals, while Declan Rice continued to build his reputation with another assured display in central midfield.
"It is not just Chicharito [who played really well], I think Rice as well," the No21 observed. "The first game was a really good test for him. Chicharito has shown his character a lot and he won't give up. He is really important for us. "There are a lot of positive things to come out of this game. I thought we played better than them definitely and were down by one man for 60 minutes."
While West Ham looked threatening in front of goal, scoring twice and having eight shots on target, the Hammers conceded three goals, including two penalties.
Slaven Bilic's side have now conceded seven goals in two matches, but Ogbonna does not believe the team have underlying defensive issues, and is optimistic they can keep a clean sheet at St James' Park. "This is the Premier League," he said. "Everyone is scared because we conceded four goals to Manchested United, but on Saturday they did the same to Swansea. "I think it is the high level of the league with a lot of good players. Manchester United can lose the next game and we can win at Newcastle United."
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Defender buzzing after netting Tottenham winner
WHUFC.com
Centre-back Josh Pask admitted he was buzzing after volleying home the winner in West Ham United U23s' 3-2 London derby win over Tottenham Hotspur on Monday afternoon. The defender, who missed large chunks of last campaign through injury, smashed in the visitors' third at Spurs' training ground to complete a superb Hammers comeback against their rivals. The hosts had gone 2-0 up in a comfortable first half but succumbed to intense West Ham pressure early in the second as Dan Kemp fired in his second in as many games before Nathan Holland equalised with a cracker. And Pask was delighted to bag the all-important third after centre-half partner Tunji Akinola had knocked down cleverly with his head. "It was a great feeling for me," said Pask. "I haven't scored in a while so coming back from a couple of injuries, of course it was good to score. I'm buzzing – it's always good to get a goal, to be fair. "Tunji did well to head the ball back towards me, and it was a pretty easy finish, I just kept my composure and volleyed it in. "Especially with the rivalry, we're all buzzing after that and we'll go again on Sunday in loads of confidence from today. It's been a decent start to the season with two wins from three, so it's so far, so good."
Manager Terry Westley lamented his side's first half performance after the game but there could be no complaints as the east Londoners raced out the blocks in the second half, stunning their opponents to eventually take home maximum points. Despite the disappointment at half time, Pask was convinced his team were always likely to find a way back into the game, he revealed afterwards. "In the first half, we were lethargic and Spurs came out strong to be fair to them. Second half though, we had a team talk and Terry gave us a good talking to, and that got us going for the second half and we came out firing. "We scored three quick goals in the second half so we'll take that and we defended very well for the rest of the game. "I knew we would have a chance to get back into it if we scored early. We have goals in our team – we know when we are attacking well we can score goals against anybody. "That's what it felt like after Kempy scored, that we were always going to get more. We have Martin [Samuelsen], Nathan [Holland], Toni [Martinez], Grady [Diangana] as well as Kempy…we have firepower and we have goals and like you can see, we scored three in about 15 minutes. "We're definitely confident going forward and we'll look to keep doing that same thing throughout the rest of our games."
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Westley on Tottenham win: I won't repeat what I said at half time!
WHUFC.com
Terry Westley praised the way his U23 side turned their performance around to beat Tottenham Hotspur on Monday having come back from 2-0 down to win 3-2.
The Academy Director was left mightily disappointed after Spurs put themselves in a comfortable position during the first half, outplaying the Hammers in every department. But after some stern words at the break – which the boss declined to repeat – the visitors came out firing and scored three quick goals to turn the game on its head. Dan Kemp halved the deficit just four minutes into the second period before Nathan Holland equalised with a screamer from long range. Centre-back Josh Pask then stunned Tottenham, volleying home after Tunji Akinola's knock-down to make it 3-2 and the Hammers held on to win their first Premier League 2 Division 1 three point-haul. After the full-time whistle, Westley said: "We're delighted with the second half performance and the character of the team, but if you're talking about the first half performance, we were miles off. "If you're talking about Premier League players, we wouldn't have been able to get back into the game. You're not getting back in that game in a top flight match. Whether it was because it was a training ground game, we didn't start aggressive enough and we didn't run hard enough. "You can talk about tactics, technical ability…sometimes it's just about running hard enough and if your man runs you better run with him. We didn't do that first half by any stretch. "Second half, we turned it around. You wouldn't want to repeat what I said at half time! It certainly wasn't about tactics or formations. It was about it being a local derby – this game should mean something. To be fair to us, we showed it afterwards. "To a man, we got after them and made it more difficult, scoring an early goal and the momentum carried us through right to the very end."
The youngsters have begun their 2017/18 campaign in fine form, and remain unbeaten with two wins from three matches. And despite the disappointing opening 45 on Monday, a couple of names did stand out throughout the game in Westley's eyes. "Vashon Neufville was terrific – probably the pick – and then the whole team were all up to an eight out of ten from a three first period," he continued. "It was that big a change. "I'm pleased for Josh Pask – he gave away a penalty first half which was dubious to say the least, so for him to get the winner was nice. "Second half, Nathan Holland was outstanding. He carried the ball, went past people, he scored a wonderful goal – that's a wonderful goal at every level. First half, it was like his twin brother who can't play – second half he was brilliant.
"If you can repeat that second 45 performance against Swansea [on Sunday], we have a good chance."
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Ray: West Ham United Ladies must make dominance count after Gillingham defeat
WHUFC.com
West Ham United Ladies General Manager Karen Ray says the team put in a dominant performance despite falling to a 1-0 defeat to Gillingham on Sunday.
The Ladies put in a convincing showing at Priestfield Stadium in their first match of the season but ultimately lost the game thanks to an 89th minute finish from Gillingham's Kallie Balfour. West Ham otherwise bossed the game with the Ladies holding the majority of possession and creating a number of excellent chances, but struggled to find that clinical moment in front of goal. Ray admitted she is disappointed following the defeat but believes the Ladies can take a number of positives from the opening day loss. "It's very frustrating to not get something out of the game, especially when you look at the number of chances we had," Ray said. "There is no doubt that we finish every game with a clear dominance in possession, now we have to convert the chances we are creating in the final third to goals. "Overall we played well, and I think the young players who came off the bench gave a very good account of themselves. They showed a real hunger for the game and their energy lifted the team."
Amber Stobbs in particular looked lively in Sunday's fixture, bamboozling the Gillingham defence on a number of occasions and creating goalscoring opportunities for her teammates. West Ham's dominance in the match failed to provide a winning result but Ray reckons losing on Sunday will only fire up the Ladies further to right those wrongs against Cardiff City in the next contest. Ray added: "I believe we will see a reaction from the Ladies for our upcoming game against Cardiff City. Everyone was disappointed with the result yesterday but the beauty of football is how quickly we can turn that around and switch our focus."
West Ham United Ladies: Yardley; Kmita, Wheeler, Austin, Auguste; Long (Ezekiel-Meade 50), Cooper, Miller (Chitae-Samuriwo 45), Stobbs, Burr, Peters (Wealthall 65)
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London Stadium 2017/18 opener sold out!
WHUFC.com
West Ham United are delighted to confirm that our opening home match of the 2017/18 Premier League season has sold out.
With three weeks remaining until newly-promoted Huddersfield Town visit London Stadium on Monday 11 September, all available seats have been snapped up by Claret Members.
The news comes a month after the full allocation of 52,000 Season Tickets – the highest number in London - sold out, with supporters on the Waiting List rushing to claim the seats available after a record renewal rate of 90% at the end of May.
Hammers fans have yet again shown their incredible support to ensure that Slaven Bilic's men will walk out to a packed house against the Terriers, when new signings Joe Hart, Pablo Zabaleta and Javier Hernandez are set to perform at their new home for the first time.
Hernandez admits he can't wait to step out in front of 57,000 fans at London Stadium, and has already been hugely impressed by the devotion and loyalty of the Hammers fans.
"It is incredible that the first home game is sold out," said Chicharito. "I knew before I arrived here that the West Ham supporters were very passionate and loyal but now I can really see just how special they are.
"One of the main attractions in signing for West Ham was the thought of walking out in front of nearly 60,000 people at a magnificent stadium, and I can't wait to experience that for the first time.
"For us as players, it is a wonderful feeling to know that we have such great support behind us, and it gives us great confidence at the start of the season."
Manager Bilic added: "Of course, it is fantastic that we have already sold out the first home game against Huddersfield, but it doesn't surprise me.
"Our supporters are a unique group, they hold a special bond with the team and I have always felt that – during my time here as a player and throughout the last two years as manager.
"When we really needed them last season, they were there to push us on, and already they are showing that they are going to be fully behind us once again when we kick off the new campaign.
"On behalf of my players and my staff, I would like to say thank you again to the fans for the backing and the support they give us.
"It is a huge motivation for us as we prepare for the start of the new season on Sunday, and we are all determined to repay them with success and some fantastic memories at London Stadium this season."
For any supporters looking to secure access to home tickets this season without a Season Ticket, the best way is to become a Claret Member. Only two Premier League games last season reached General Sale, so becoming a Claret Member really is the best way to ensure you are able to secure a seat for games at London Stadium.
Membership is priced at just £40 adults and £25 under-16s and entitles you to priority on home tickets, access to our ticket exchange, a £5 discount on official away coach travel, access to exclusive events, retail offers throughout the season and a unique gift pack.
However, our patient supporters on the Waiting List can take advantage of a £10 discount on Membership if signing up before 8 September – the only to guarantee an opportunity to watch the excitement at London Stadium this season!
For more information, or to sign up today, please click here.
If you missed out on a ticket for Huddersfield, you will still have the opportunity to be there to watch our exciting new signings Chicharito, Pablo Zabaleta and Joe Hart on home turf for the first time as the Ticket Exchange is now open.
Tickets will become available to purchase as Season Ticket Holders who can't attend relist their seats, giving other supporters the chance to see the Hammers in action while earning Club Cash towards future ticketing purchases themselves. Claret Members can now purchase from the Ticket Exchange.
Furthermore, as the Hammers' first home match of the new campaign falls on a Monday evening, supporters will be able to upgrade Junior Season Tickets for Adult tickets at a discounted rate. Click here for full information.
A limited number of tickets for the unmissable London derby against Tottenham Hotspur are still available for Claret Members. Hurry to secure yours now! Click here to purchase.
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Chicharito and Zabaleta welcome fans to London Stadium
WHUFC.com
West Ham United fans from all over the world descended on the London Stadium Store to meet Chicharito and Pablo Zabaleta on Monday. Hundreds of supporters had a grey late summer's afternoon brightened by spending time with their heroes, collecting autographs and posing for selfies. The Hammers' new Mexican striking superstar attracted dozens of supporters of his hometown club Guadalajara, many of whom departed wearing the Claret and Blue of West Ham. For the No17, who grew up idolising his own heroes in the red and white of Guadalajara and green of Mexico, the importance of spending time with those who cheer you on is huge. "I grew up like them, asking for signatures and for photographs from everyone!" he smiled. "My Granddad was a footballer and my Dad as well, so I always tried to the autographs and photos from the other players. "This type of event lets us be close to the fans who make our stadium full and travel all over the country to away games or watch our games on television, so they are very important for us as well." "My favourite thing I got was not a signature or a photo but there was a goalkeeper for Mexico called Jorge Campos who was a legend in my country and I don't know why, but when I was a kid I loved to play as a goalkeeper, so my Dad got me his gloves and his shirt! "At that moment, he was very popular because of the colour of the uniforms that he wore, so I think that was the best thing I collected when I was a child!"
Alongside the hundreds of local parents and schoolchildren dressed proudly in their West Ham shirts were Chicharito fans from all over Mexico, including many from his home city of Guadalajara, where he began his prolific career at the age of nine. "He is really humble and he teaches that if you want to achieve great things in your life, you just need to keep going and never give up and be confident – that's why this guy means so much to us," said Guadalajara native Juan Alvarez, who is studying at Durham University. "We went to Southampton and I became a Hammer with all the fans, I'm going to Newcastle and I'm going to follow the Club from now." "We love Chicharito and we are really lucky to be here to meet him!" said Ana Galindo, who lives in Sonora in Mexico's north west. "He is special because he is the best Mexican football player and we really feel good about his accomplishments."
Also waiting patiently were newlyweds Cruz and Elizabeth Pena, who made meeting their hero a must-do on their honeymoon in London! "We are so happy to be here to meet Chicharito!" Cruz told whufc.com. "He is the biggest player in Mexico, so he's really important in our town and he's also a great guy. "This is very important and maybe I'm going to give Chicha a kiss if it's not a problem. This is the best moment of my honeymoon!"
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AWAY DAYS: CHELTENHAM
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 21 AUGUST 2017 AT 10:13PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by Craig Podevin @CraigPodevin
And so our cup adventure starts. I think we played very well to come back and level from 2-0 down with 10 men against Southampton away from home too! Some of the negativity has been well over the top. I'm expecting to see a weaker 11 for this game, but let's hope the players coming into the side have a point to prove.
General information:
Stadium: LCI Stadium
Capacity: 7,066 (3,912 seats)
Address: Whaddon Road, Cheltenham, GL52 5NA
Away seating: 1,100
Despite being built in 1927 and being the home of Cheltenham Town since 1932, the LCI stadium didn't host senior football for 67 years. Two of the stands have been renovated/built in the last 20 years, including the Hazlewoods Stand (2005) and the Thomson & Bancks stand (2001). There is a small electronic scoreboard on top of the roof of the Hazlewoods Stand.
The view of the playing area is said to be good. Away fans are seated in the Hazlewoods Stand and sometimes, if required, the Thomson & Bancks stand.
Travel:
Train
Cheltenham Railway Station is over 2 miles from the stadium, so it is advised to get a taxi or bus from the station to the ground. Bus service D runs from the station car park to the Town Centre every 10 minutes and costs £3.40 for an all day ticket. From the town centre, it's a short walk to the stadium down Prestbury Road. You can get the bus going the other way after the game, where it stops outside a Tesco near the station.
Car
If you wish to drive, enter GL52 5NA in your sat nav or follow directions below.
From the M25, leave Junction 16 onto the M40. Continue on the M40 until Junction 8, where you come onto the A40. Stay on the A40 until you come to the B4075 on your right and turn down there. At the end of the road, turn left, then right onto Cleeve View Road (Berkhampstead School will be on the corner). At the end of Cleeve View Road, turn left, and you will see the ground on your right.
Parking
Parklands Social Club (mentioned below in the food and drink section) has car parking available for £4 if you wish to park your car there.
There are limited spaces available to park at the stadium (at a cost of £5), but you can pre-book with Cheltenham by calling 01242 573 558 (*according to grimsby-townfc.co.uk). There isn't much space for street parking nearby.
Food and drink:
A club bar nearby called Robins Nest allows a limited number of away fans for £1 admittance.
Kemble Brewery Inn on Fairview Street is listed in the CAMRA Good Beer Guide, which has always proved popular when visiting football grounds on away fixtures.
10 minutes away from the stadium lies the Sudeley Arms and Conservatory pubs on Prestbury Road with a chip shop in between them. To find these from the stadium car park, turn left at the end of the road, straight over the roundabout and the Sudeley Arms will be on your left with the Conservatory on the right.
Very near the ground is the Parklands Social Club, which has a few TV screens.
Inside the ground, you can choose from burgers (£2.80), a half pounder with cheese (£4), hot dogs (£3), gourmet pies (£3.20), bacon rolls (£3), Cornish pasties (£3) or sausage rolls (£2.50).
Let's hope this fixture can be the start of a memorable cup run for us this year. Stay safe and enjoy the game, Come On You Irons! -@CraigPodevin
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TIME TO BRING RIO HOME!
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 21 AUGUST 2017 AT 9:17PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by FarehamHammer @farehamhammer
No we are not in a crisis, we are not going to be relegated, and I still think we will flourish this season. Nothing has changed, we still have work to do in this window. Requirements remain the same: defensive midfielder, a creative midfielder, a striker. This is because there is more chance that Donald Trump will stay off Twitter for the week than Sakho and Carroll lasting a season, without being injured at least twice, it is La La land stuff to think otherwise. The shrewdest bit of business this window however would be to bring Rio Ferdinand back to the club as defensive coach. If Gold and Sullivan could get Big Sam to bring in Teddy Sheringham as attacking coach, they can likewise do the same to Slaven, regarding bringing Rio Ferdinand in. It would give the whole club a lift!
I like Slaven, but alarm bells are starting to ring, even amongst his most loyal supporters and questions must be asked. His backroom staff need a dramatic overhaul, we don't even look fit for starters. Time to get rid of Miljenko Rak, the 70 year old Fitness Coach, and replace him with a younger Fitness Coach. It must be bye bye Julian Dicks, the sacked former Grays Athletic Coach who is nothing more than a BBC -bibs, bags, cones man. Only appointed as a sop to the fans. Many have deep reservations about our centre backs not without reason. Yes, they get very little protection from a woeful midfield, which hopefully we will rectify soon. Even so, Slaven's decision to send both, Reece Oxford and Reece Burke on loan without a replacement is ABSOLUTELY POTTY!
As things stand we are only a few injuries away, from potentially having a back four consisting of Zabaleta at right back, with a centre back pairing of Fonte and Collins. An absolute F++++++ disaster! You and I, could get behind that defence and cause havoc that partnership would turn slower than sour milk. That is the ridiculous position we find ourselves in. Gold and Sullivan, MUST bring a centre back in is the cry no doubt. But they shouldn't have to and would not have had to if we had Rio Ferdinand in as defensive Coach. Imagine how much quicker both Reece's and Declan Rice would develop under the watchful eye of Ferdinand? They would be ready in no time, instead our manager sends them out on loan, leaving us paper thin at centre back in particular. Fearing for our lives that we don't land up playing the likes of Chelsea, relying on a defence consisting of Dad's Army. It is not just the centre backs that would develop under Rio, the whole first team squad would. I could see the likes of Aaron Cresswell and Sam Byram in particular, really develop as top class defenders under the former England player.
One of the biggest problems with the West Ham defence is we don't function as a unit. At times we resemble the keystone cops! A good defensive unit has won many a football match. Ferdinand has played in some of the best units in the business, and won many a trophy in the process. He is a winner and a leader, which would rub off on the defence. Tony Carr once said to me, that a footballer can have all the talent in the world and still not make the grade for a whole host of reasons. Temptations off the field, simply not being mentally strong enough, the life of a footballer with all the trappings and fame, can still be a lonely world. Rio Ferdinand having been there and got the t-shirt, he would be able to spot the pitfalls early and help players who otherwise might be lost to the game for good. Time to bring Rio Ferdinand, one of our own, leader of men back home.
Even with Rio back home, the defence needs protection from the midfield, once again the midfield's soft underbelly was exposed against Southampton. No movement, no pace, no invention, simply cannot keep possession of the ball. A defensive midfielder is a must and very quickly. We have been on the verge of signing William Carvalho for an eternity. A great defensive midfield who can spot a pass early. Yes, I would welcome him but I do have reservations on spending the amount of dough on him that it would take to sign him. This is why: IF he can go on strike to force a move to us, what happens if he has a great first season and the likes of Manchester United, Liverpool or Arsenal come calling? I fear he would do exactly to us what he is attempting to do to Sporting. We certainly don't want a Dimitri Payet part two do we? It would make perfect sense, if The Club looked at other options besides Carvalho. If big bill signs him I would get right behind him as I do any player who dons The Claret and Blue. It has not the best of starts but certainly not a crisis. Bring him home ….bring Rio home. We are more than a football club, we're a way of life! COYI!!!
Farehamhammer!
(Edited by Danny Twigg)
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SPURS UNDER 23 2 V 3 WEST HAM UNITED UNDER 23
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 21 AUGUST 2017 AT 9:32PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by Jack Lebeau @JackLebeau65
It was an amazing comeback for West Ham U23 today as we beat our London rivals Spurs 3-2 in a thrilling encounter at their own training ground.
Well, first of all, what a game to go and see for free at midday on a Monday afternoon (despite the weather!) The facilities at their training ground looked incredible & it was a beautiful place. Enough of talking up Spurs though!
We started the better side and should have been in-front if it were not for Martinez missing a couple of great chances, both after some brilliant play from Dan Kemp. We dominated early proceedings but Spurs did eventually get into the game and with that brought some chances for the home side. Inevitably, they took the lead going 1-0 up after a Josh Pask deflection sent the ball rolling into the back of the net. Spurs doubled their lead just before half-time from the penalty spot via Edwards who blatantly dived to win the penalty himself.
It took us just 18 minutes though in the second half to complete an incredible comeback with Kemp notching the first within just four minutes of the whistle to begin the second half, expertly tapping home from a beautiful Neufville cross.
Spurs' defenders continued to struggle with the threat of Man of the Match Dan Kemp, but it was his opposite winger Nathan Holland (amazing in the second half, constantly opening up Spurs' midfield & defence), who netted the equaliser with a lovely curled shot into the far right-hand side of the net. Pask finally overturned the scores volleying home from an Akinola knock-down.
Spurs began to do what they do best and put the pressure on, but our defenders responded well & were solid in dealing with the threat their attackers posed. Alex Pike for example notably cleared the ball off the line late on despite Spurs fans & players claiming the ball had actually gone over!
In reality, the scores could of been a lot higher if it were not for Trott, Pask & Neufville keeping us in the game & Martinez missing a huge number of chances. It's a weird one with Martinez as after being so deadly in front of goal last season, he has struggled to finish his chances in his three games this season, maybe he is more suited to playing at CAM? Who knows, but he was better off the ball today further back.
Interestingly, I stood next to what was clearly a scout whilst at the game, and he was making notes about all of our players throughout. Here's what I managed to oversee; Holland is quick & has a great first touch, Pike has good mentality, Samuelsen goes down easily, Martinez closes down well. He also had loads to note on Neufville & Kemp but I couldn't read any of them.
I thought the assessment of Samuelsen going down too easily was a bit unfair today. I'd say in general I agree with him but he was clamped a couple of times today and did go off with a knock at half-time as a result. Pike started well but faded as the game went on, but he led the back-line very well & should be captain of that side, not Makasi. Also have to say Noha Sylvestre was very impressive & solid at DM when he played for half hour; rarely misplaced a pass & got himself out of some tricky situations when challenged by two Spurs' players at once.
I'd say a draw would have been more of a fair result but I can't complain with us getting the three points in the manner we did! That's now four points from two games in the higher division after also drawing with last season's champions Everton 0-0.
West Ham U23's next game is at Dagenham's Chigwell Construction Stadium on Sundayagainst Swansea (free for ST Holders of both us & Dagenham) with kick-off at 1pm, then we play Spurs U23 again (at Stevenage's Lamex Stadium) on Thursday 31st August in the cup (7:45pm KO).
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Hackett - Mason had a stinker
KUMB.com
Filed: Monday, 21st August 2017
By: Staff Writer
Former referee Keith Hackett has criticised Lee Mason for his performance in West Ham's 3-2 defeat at Southampton on Saturday. Hackett, who was in charge of the 1991 FA Cup semi final during which Tony Gale was infamously sent off (and has a KUMB Award named after him as a result) hit our at Mason following his performance in Saturday's Premier League clash at St Mary's. Critical of Mason's decision not to dismiss Mark Noble, Hackett also insisted that the decision to award the hosts a last minute penalty was "soft". "The big talking point of the weekend, for me, was the performance of Lee Mason at Southampton," Hackeet told the Telegraph. "He really struggled and I've questioned his ability before to look comfortable and control a game at Premier League level.
"Mason is a very experienced official but he doesn't relax. Mark Noble was clearly off the ground with two feet and it was a clear red card for the challenge on Mario Lemina, yet the referee lets it go. "By allowing Noble to get away with it, other players suddenly think they can take control, and we'd already seen an outrageous elbow from Marko Arnautovic, which got him sent off. "Then there was the penalty, for Southampton's winning goal, which we all feel was a soft one. But when the referee has an indifferent performance and he makes the big calls, they are questioned by all of us."
Hackett also called for assistant referees to be granted accees to video replays, as is the case now with both rugby and cricket. "As the season unfolds, with a limited number of top referees since we've lost Mark Clattenburg, it will only become more important that we utilise it," he insisted.
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Southampton 3-2 West Ham (And Other Ramblings)
KUMb.com
Filed: Monday, 21st August 2017
By: HeadHammerShark
It's impossible, it feels to me, to be able to accurately convey the feeling of being a West Ham fan to other people. We can try, certainly, but the reality is that all football fans are convinced they are on a rollercoaster journey of zeniths and nadirs that is unmatched anywhere else in the world.
There are Manchester United fans who will genuinely look you in the eye and tell you without irony that it is agony supporting their team, despite the fact that the entire sport is geared towards making sure they win. That's just the essence of being a fan. We all need to feel it's a glorious test of loyalty.
A look that just screams "experienced, error free defending"
But this game... this game might just be the very essence of supporting West Ham. The perfect distillation of agony and ecstasy, bravery and incompetence, Hernandez and Fonte, stupid David Sullivan decisions and even stupider David Sullivan decisions. I want you to pull up a chair, sit down there, pull on your Robert Snodgrass replica top and let me tell you about the day that West Ham went to St Mary's and West Hammed the absolute almighty fuck out of this game of football.
***
The story begins months ago, in March 2015, when Winston Reid signed a new six and a half year deal with the club. This would have taken him to his age 33 season which everybody knows is when centre backs are just about to hit their prime. Because of this our genius Director of Football, Professor David Sullivan, decided that we also needed to buy out another two years of Reid's career meaning that on the cusp of this game he signed yet another contract extension. This pointless endeavour now means that we get to pay Reid right the way up until he is 35 years old. Remember gang, long term planning is for wusses.
The way you can tell this is a good idea, by the way, is simply by checking how many 35 year old centre backs started in the Premier League this weekend. None. Boy, it feels great to be a trailblazer. West Ham, ladies and gentlemen.
Anyway, flush with his new contract Reid promptly got injured in the warm up for this game because of course he fucking did. There is nothing more West Ham in the universe than new signings getting stretchered off, even when they're just contract extensions.
Into the team came Angelo Ogbonna, himself a recent recipient of a long term extension whilst recovering from an operation, who had been dropped after doing a passable impersonation of a kindly doorman at Old Trafford last week - "None shall pass! Except you! And you! Oh go on then, you too!". So one game into the season, half of the back four who had presumably been training together all pre season were out. We were rapidly approaching peak West Ham and the game hadn't even bloody started.
***
It's been a bad week for statues in the South. In the US they are wanting to pull down these unmoving, rigid monuments to another time, and replace them with something more appropriate. At West Ham we just buy them from Southampton for £8m. And so it was that Jose Fonte had a first half here that could have been painted by Hieronymous Bosch, so hellish was it.
Jose Fonte marks Manolo Gabbiadini for the opening goal
Despite having stocked up on cod liver oil before the start, Jose looked miles off the pace. Saints hadn't scored at home since April, but if doctors were going to prescribe treatment for such ailments this West Ham team would be at the top of the list. As such it took all of eleven minutes for Manolo Gabbiadini to run in behind the Portuguese and score the exact same goal he scored against us in February. On another day I might have questioned Joe Hart's positioning but until he plays with an actual back four in front of him there's no point making any judgements.
Things somehow got worse from there as we looked hopelessly ineffective going forward and totally disorganised defensively. Southampton could have had a second before Marko Arnautovic - another of Professor Sullivan's new arrivals - decided that the only possible way to improve things was to elbow Jack Stephens in the face. It led to a deserved red card, and in reality is the kind of incident where the perpetrator can consider himself lucky to only get a three match ban. On a day when our new signings seemed to forget they were no longer at their previous clubs, the Austrian went full Stoke at the moment we least needed it.
Arnautovic's lapse was so brainless that it would almost four minutes before any other West Ham player did something so stupid. This time, Fonte got himself the wrong side of Steven Davis and made up for it by dragging him down by the neck. It was a blatant penalty and even though Dusan Tadic - the worst penalty taker in the universe - took the kick it deflected off Hart and in.
***
The first thirty eight minutes of this game were a painful dagger to the notion that this West Ham team is going to be different. On a day when the sun was broiling, and the heat was like a character in the action that needed to be acknowledged and factored into the plot, this was supposed to be the day our season started. Many fans were content to write off the opening day debacle at Old Trafford - you can't expect to win there, they said. If we can't expect to win there with a team bought and constructed with the sole purpose of winning right now then we'll never win there, I thought, but that's an argument for another day.
The weather was glorious. Players were returning. Hope was rising. This was the start.
It should have been a home game, of course. If it had, you rather fancy things might have turned out differently. It's rare for teams to concede two penalties and have a player sent off in a home match, even in a stadium as sterile as ours. On another day, in our postcode, it is possible Tadic wouldn't have even been on the pitch to take his penalty. His early mistimed lunge at Hernandez might have returned a different colour card if fifty thousand home fans had been able to give their opinion on it. As it was, referee Lee Mason waved a yellow and cultivated the sense of injustice that seemingly led Arnautovic to remove his cerebrum.
At 2-0 and a man down, it was impossible to see a way back. Only proper teams fight back from such situations. Teams who are organised, pacey and motivated can face such odds and defy them. This just isn't in the West Ham DNA, to be honest. In my thirty years of watching, such comebacks can be counted on one hand, like the number of actual jokes in the entire run of The Big Bang Theory. True West Ham fans were hunkering down, preparing for the worst. Maybe keep it to 4-0 against this team who haven't scored in 500 minutes and that won't be a bad result. We'll go again next week. We always do well at Newcastle, don't we?
And then, hope.
***
Let's face it, if the first half of this game was everything shit about supporting West Ham, then the second was the reason we all go. This was a reason to believe. This was life affirming.
Michail Antonio has been out for months. He started this game, somewhat surprisingly but then between injuries and the failure of Professor Sullivan's January arrival - Snodgrass - we're a bit light on wide players. Antonio eased his way into the action, but when we needed him most he stood up like Ethan Hawke in Dead Poets Society. "Oh captain, my captain. I'll do your running". A man light, he simply took on the work of two men and began to carry the ball through the weak looking home midfield with energy and purpose.
West Ham's second half. Fuckin' A
Our first came on the cusp of half time, when Antonio had no right to turn or shoot but managed to do both, and Fraser Forster parried weakly for Hernandez to score the kind of unremarkable but entirely necessary goal that it feels we have been doing without for years.
At 2-1 down, there wasn't much more reason to believe than the simple fact that that's what we're supposed to do, but the second half was different in almost every way. Where we lacked cohesiveness and purpose we now had unity and ambition. Antonio was doing yeoman labour, but Hernandez was covering himself in glory too. Shifted to an unfamiliar left sided position he dutifully did his defensive work and when the time came, made slamming home the equaliser look far easier than it was.
The truth of that second half is that we were as good then as we were inept in the first. Young Declan Rice and Mark Noble held the midfield and Cresswell and Zabaleta coped manfully with the twin Southampton creative threats of Redmond and Tadic. Indeed, it was only when James Ward-Prowse joined the fray that the home side looked like being an attacking threat again. There was no pace to our play particularly - there can't be with such a slow team - but through repeated and persistent knocking on the door Cresswell and Sakho prised it open just enough for the Little Pea to slip through and give us hope. A comeback from absolutely nowhere, the kind to have you belting out "Bubbles" long into the night, and falling headfirst back in love with everything you believed when you first fell in love with football.
West Ham, ladies and gentlemen.
***
Remember though, we're telling the story of West Ham here, a walking Greek tragedy of a football team. Whilst it's easy to blame the late lapse on some sort of lifelong gypsy hex, the reality is the team were exhausted by their efforts with ten men and a pre season fitness regime that seems to have produced a team in the image of Dawn French. It's almost as though playing German third division teams isn't great preparation for the Premier League.
West Ham are about to salvage a point, you say?
And so it came to pass that a long, searching Ward-Prowse pass arced into our area with just seconds to go. The target was home centre back Maya Yoshida, who would have needed to have been Spiderman to have actually done anything with it. At that precise moment, it was possible to see why Professor Sullivan was so keen to sign 32 year old Zabaleta. The Argentine used all his experience to usher the ball out of play and shepherd us to an unlikely, but season launching point. Except he didn't. Of course he fucking didn't.
I can see Zabaleta's point of view. He's been making that challenge for years at Manchester City and not getting pinged for it. Had he been playing for Manchester City in this game it wouldn't have been given. It was a marginal call, and when in doubt Premier League referees will always err on the side of a decision that won't be analysed for twenty minutes on Monday Night Football, or require a column from Jeff Winter in a newspaper. The problem is that games between West Ham and Southampton don't attract that kind of attention, so referees will just make normal, regular decisions. He's lost the protection of the Abu Dhabi millions.
To call Lee Mason a cheat for awarding a penalty is to fundamentally misunderstand referees. They don't care who wins so long as they get an easy life. They're humans and so they act like humans. They get most things right, some things wrong and every now and again they can be influenced by large crowds. That's not cheating.
Would that penalty have been given for Southampton against Manchester City? No. Would it have been given at the Olympic Stadium? Less likely, but possibly. Would I have wanted it if it had been up the other end? You bet your life I would. We can't complain - Zabaleta just needs to remember who he's playing for now. It's the entire bloody reason we signed him, after all.
After that, the penalty was taken by a player that Professor Sullivan publicly insulted last season, who promptly scored his first goal in nine months after our captain convinced him to put it the other side because Joe Hart knew what way he was going. West Ham, ladies and gentlemen.
***
So what are we supposed to make of all this? I guess it depends upon how you choose to view results so far. If last season is a single, discrete event that you have wrapped up and parked on a shelf then I guess it is too early to make judgements. One away game against the best looking, most expensive team in the league and another where we played the majority of the game with ten men are no barometer of anything. Equally, our best player has yet to appear and as is customary at this time of year, we have plenty of injuries. Other teams hit the opening weeks at full speed, whereas we use them to get our players fit. It's little wonder we get off to such routinely awful starts.
But for those who see Bilic's reign through the longer lens, then this is all just the continuation of the same old stuff. Since we were last at St Mary's we've played 16 games and won 3. That's the sort of nonsense that got Allardyce fired, and he never had the kind of financial backing that Bilic is getting. More tellingly is that fact that we've kept only four clean sheets in that time, despite him playing three different goalkeepers, and at least seven different defensive set ups that I can remember.
Guys, why is nobody defending?
Some of you will scream about injuries, as though this is somehow new or unique. Injuries are so endemic to West Ham that it is time to stop thinking of them as an unusual circumstance and instead accept that they are a simple fact for West Ham managers. Bilic will always have someone injured and so he needs to develop a way of playing that is less dependent upon individuals and more built towards the strengths of the group. I despised Allardyce's style of play, but I accept that he fashioned a system that meant players could come and go and not be confused by what they were supposed to be doing. Does anybody think our current system amounts to much more than "Oh well, Lanzini will be back soon"?
Having watched Bilic's teams for two seasons I have no idea how he wants to play. He asked for pace in his team this summer and got none, so now I don't know if he's a shill for the board or if he's changed his mind and he is happy having a side this pedestrian. We are lacking depth in the centre of midfield and yet Reece Oxford is off playing in the Bundesliga for reasons I cannot fathom. He doesn't seem to think either of his left backs are any good and signed a goalkeeper when he had a perfectly good one already. Perhaps the most obvious example of the totally disjointed thinking surrounding the club was spending £10m on Robert Snodgrass to replace Payet, replacing him with £24m Marko Arnautovic six months later and then banishing him from the squad altogether when he might have been very useful on a day like this one. He is currently being hawked round Championship sides with Professor Sullivan apparently bemused that his value has dropped so much in six months. Someone please explain to the Professor that perhaps the problem is he overpaid unnecessarily to start with.
It's worth remembering all of that when you read about the board quibbling over a £5.5m gap in the valuation of William Carvalho with Sporting Lisbon. Perhaps if someone at the club - ANYONE - had more of an idea about squad building and transfers, we wouldn't have to worry about such a relatively small amount.
***
In the end, I've landed here. I'm terrified about the parallels to 2002/03, but it's far too early to judge this particular team. If nothing else, Bilic is still clearly able to motivate his team to play for him, and that is certainly worth something. I think you have to give them ten games, the return of Lanzini and (I guess?) Carroll before making any firm pronouncements.
But equally, saying "It's just two games" is disingenuous bullshit. None of these problems are new - none of them. Read what Rich Sprent had to say about all of this after the game on Saturday. The facts are dismal reading - 92 goals conceded in the last 50 league games played! How is that sustainable? £20m on Andre Ayew and still no obvious answer to where he should be playing? A sudden drop in net spend after years spent wasting it like a wedding planner? It's not really a surprise that the team play so incoherently when all around them is chaos.
I've been off the Bilic bandwagon for a while now, despairing of those many gutless surrenders against the top teams last season, but I'm not seeing any reason to jump back on it here. When he does eventually go, it will because of a myriad of reasons. A failure to stand up to the Board when needed, a misplaced belief that he could build a system around a player as unreliable as Carroll and probably the Payet thing too. But in the end, it will boil down to the simple fact that his teams have never, ever been able to defend. It's incredible considering his playing career, but there it is. A team managed by a centre half, that can look glorious going forward and like Gloria Hunniford defending.
West Ham, ladies and gentlemen.
Please note that the opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, nor should be attributed to, KUMB.com.
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Javier Hernandez impressed by West Ham's spirit despite early-season defeats
Last Updated: 21/08/17 7:18pm
SSN
Javier Hernandez is encouraged by the spirit at West Ham despite defeat in his first two games for the club. Two goals from the summer signing hauled the Hammers back from 2-0 down to 2-2 at Southampton on Saturday after Marko Arnautovic had been sent off. And while a late penalty gave Saints the points, Hernandez saw enough in his side's never-say-die attitude to leave him positive about the season ahead. He told Sky Sports News: "We need to look forward, we need to be positive. We cannot stay in the good memories or the bad memories. "That's the good thing about football - you have the chance of revenge every weekend or every two games per week. That's a good thing."
West Ham were beaten 4-0 at Hernandez's old club Manchester United on the opening weekend, but the £16m striker had the chance to show his predatory instincts at St Mary's. He said: "It gave me a lot of confidence, not only because I scored the goals but because of the spirit of the whole team. "I was lucky to score two, but we showed spirit and hunger and we want to prove in every match we will fight until the end to get a good result."
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West Ham eyeing up Slaven Bilic replacements just 2 games into the new season after back-to-back losses
Bosses who spent big on new faces this summer have been rewarded with two defeats and seven goals against
The Mirror
BYNEIL MCLEMAN
22:30, 21 AUG 2017
West Ham are already weighing up potential successors to Slaven Bilic following their disappointing start to the season. Former Croatia national team coach Bilic is under scrutiny and the Hammers have begun drawing up contingency plans with only two rounds of Premier League games played. Co-owners David Gold and David Sullivan are known for their reluctance to make mid-season managerial changes and Bilic's current contract is up at the end of the season, but they are wary of being dragged into another relegation battle after last season's struggles. And a failure to oversee a quick upturn in results could leave Bilic in danger and force the Hammers hierarchy to reassess sooner. West Ham travel to fourth-tier Cheltenham in the Carabao Cup on Wednesday before back-to-back games against promoted sides Newcastle (away) and Huddersfield (home) either side of the international break. Ironically, the Magpies' Rafa Benitez is one manager who remains well-thought of at West Ham, despite turning them down in 2015 to take the Real Madrid job, and he is unhappy with the Tyneside club's summer transfer business. Bilic has been heavily backed in the transfer window this summer with Pablo Zabaleta, Joe Hart, Marko Arnautovic and Javier Hernandez all arriving.
But West Ham have started the season with two defeats at Manchester United and Southampton, despite a stirring initial fightback from 2-0 down at St Mary's despite being reduced to 10 men by Arnautovic's dismissal. Their trend of conceding late goals has also continued, with three more shipped in the final four minutes of their opening two fixtures. Transfers and who has the final say on who West Ham sign has also been another source of tension behind the scenes, with Bilic's influence in that area understood to have been reduced. The 48-year-old was on shaky ground last season after the club flirted with relegation during a turbulent first season at the London Stadium, but he was kept on after talks with the board at the end of the campaign. However his hopes of making a strong start to this new season have not been helped by circumstances beyond his control. West Ham are having to play their first four games away from home due to the London Stadium being used for the recent World Athletics Championships. He has also been unable to field his strongest side yet, due to injuries. Manuel Lanzini, Cheikhou Kouyate and Andy Carroll have yet to feature this season. Michail Antonio and Aaron Cresswell made their first starts at Southampton. But on the day they returned, Bilic suffered another injury setback when defender Winston Reid went off on a stretcher after damaging his calf during the warm-up. In addition, he will be without Arnautovic for three games following the Austrian's straight red card in the first half at St Mary's.
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West Ham ready for William Carvalho transfer chase to drag on until very end of the summer window
Sporting Lisbon need to sell but hope rival interest will help them net close to the midfielder's £40m buyout clause
The Mirror
BYADRIAN KAJUMBA
22:30, 21 AUG 2017
West Ham are braced for their club-record bid to land William Carvalho to go right to the wire. Sporting Lisbon are playing hardball over the Euro 2016 winning midfielder, who boss Slaven Bilic hopes to make his fifth summer signing. The Portuguese side need to sell but, with rival interest, they are holding out for as close to the 25-year-old's £40m buyout clause as possible. And the Hammers are ready for negotiations to go as far as the last few days of the transfer window as they try to reach a compromise.
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Gareth Southgate considering dropping Joe Hart for Jack Butland as England number one
Telegraph.co.uk
John Percy
21 AUGUST 2017 • 10:30PM
Jack Butland is moving ahead of Joe Hart in the battle to become England's No. 1, with Gareth Southgate considering the Stoke City goalkeeper for the World Cup qualifier in Malta. Southgate made a personal trip to watch Butland in Stoke's 1-0 win over Arsenal at the bet365 Stadium on Saturday and is giving serious thought to recalling him for the international games next month. Hart's place is under threat after conceding seven goals in two games since joining West Ham United on loan and Butland is now in line to make his first international appearance since the friendly against Germany in March 2016.
Butland suffered a fractured ankle in that game in Berlin and was stretchered off, enduring a frustrating 13 months without playing after a string of setbacks. But the 24-year-old returned to the Stoke team at the end of last season and Southgate named him in the squads for England's World Cup qualifier against Scotland and the friendly in France in June. Southgate is keen to see Butland in competitive action for the national team and is set to start him in the qualifier against Malta on September 1 if his impressive form continues. England also play Slovakia three days later in a qualifier at Wembley.
Hart remains admired within the England set-up, with his experience still regarded as crucial, but there is now a genuine chance for Butland to stake a claim. Butland was a regular for the England under-21s during Southgate's time in charge and was appointed as captain. Those leadership qualities are seen as essential for England's future, with Southgate attempting to establish a core of young players with responsibility, including new captain Harry Kane. Everton's new £30million signing Jordan Pickford is also seen as a future England No. 1 while Burnley's Tom Heaton and Southampton's Fraser Forster are admired within the Football Association. Butland, however, is now seriously in Southgate's thoughts to become the first-choice and looks set to get his opportunity next month. Mark Hughes, the Stoke manager, believes the £3.5million signing from Birmingham could become one of the best goalkeepers in the world. "Jack wants to be the best he can be and that's all you hope for in players, that attitude – and he has the means to do it as well. He's an outstanding keeper technically and he's got the physical attributes to be a top line keeper, we all understand that," he said. "Clearly he has had a set-back with the injury and he needs to move on from that by having a good season, really impressing and moving up a level."
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WEST HAM ENTER RACE TO SIGN GRZEGORZ KRYCHOWIAK
MICHAEL OLIVER @MichaelOIiver
ReadWestHam
West Ham are still trying hard to secure a deal to sign William Carvalho from Sporting this summer but are readying contingency plans if that isn't to be.
One of those plans is to make a move to sign Grzegorz Krychowiak from PSG, but the Hammers will face competition from Chelsea for the Poland international.
Krychowiak was signed by PSG last summer for €33m from Sevilla but struggled to make his mark in the side last season and has been made available for transfer this summer. The Hammers are desperate to bring in a defensive midfielder and Krychowiak is one of the best talents on the market right now, but being at PSG, there's every chance that West Ham would be unable to meet his wage demands, making a loan move for the player much more likely than a permanent transfer. Porto's Danilo Pereira and Benfica's Ljubomir Fejsa have both also been mentioned as alternatives to Carvalho.
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ARE WE NEARING THE END OF THE MARK NOBLE ERA?
By Iain Dale 21 Aug 2017 at 17:00
WTID
It still seems touch and go as to whether we will, in the end, clinch the signing of Sporting Lisbon midfield general William Cavalho. If he does sign for us, there could be severe implications for our current midfield four of Mark Noble, Cheikhou Kouyate, Pedro Obiang and Edimilson Fernandes. And then of course there's the new boy on the block, Declan Rice. Rice, it should be pointed out, is a centre back who is doing a sterling job as a defensive midfielder, but given our performance yesterday, perhaps a move back to central defence might happen sooner rather than later. But I digress.
If you pay £30 million pounds for a player and he's your record signing it's a fair bet he becomes the first name on the team sheet. But assuming we continue to play in a 4-2-3-1 formation, two other players could become very unhappy indeed. Given Pedro Obiang's performances last season, when he was probably our second best and most consistent player (behind Michail Antonio) he could reasonably expect to be a first choice pick this season. He's also been rewarded with a new five year contract. However, his performance against Manchester United saw him relegated to the bench yesterday.
Edimilson Fernandes has proved to be an excellent signing. He is certainly one for the future and last season it was clear that Slaven Bilic saw him supplanting Mark Noble sometime this season. Trouble is, Cavalho might well be the one to do that.
Then there's Kouyate, who has been an absolute star since he joined us from Anderlecht. He's a man mountain and has the added advantage of also being able to play in central defence. He can also score goals and tends to venture forward more than Noble or Obiang.
So if you had to pick a first choice defensive midfield two from Cavalho, Kouyate, Obiang, Noble and Fernandes, who would you pick?
Surely it would have to be Cavalho and Kouyate. I suspect there will be some away games where we play a defensive midfield three. Even then, I wonder how many of us would pick Mark Noble ahead of Obiang or even Fernandes.
It's an awful thing to write, isn't it? But it seems to me that Mark Noble's days as an automatic first pick might be drawing to a close. Perhaps his main role this season will be to try to change the course of a match from the bench. But here's the thing: Isn't Fernandes more likely to be able to do that?
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Winston Reid injury adds to West Ham defensive woes amid transfer search
KEN DYER
ES Sport
West Ham will be without Winston Reid for Saturday's clash at Newcastle, adding to the problems for a side without a win in their first two matches and with seven goals conceded.
Reid injured a calf muscle in the warm-up before their 3-2 defeat at Southampton and although manager Slaven Bilic has since revealed the injury is "not serious", the central defender will not have recovered in time for the match at St James' Park.
Reid, who recently signed a new long-term deal, will also miss New Zealand's two World Cup qualifiers against the Solomon Islands but should be fit to return after the international break for his club's first home match, against newly-promoted Huddersfield, on September 11.
Bilic sees no need to strengthen the central defensive positions, despite another poor defensive display on Saturday.
"We have enough centre-backs in our team if they stay fit," he said. "You can't have eight players in one situation. We have one position we want to fill unless someone else goes and we have to fill in."
That priority is a defensive midfielder, with West Ham's bid to sign Portugal international William Carvalho edging closer.
Carvalho's club, Sporting Lisbon, are holding out for £38million while West Ham's latest offer is £30m, with another £6m in player-related bonuses. The player is keen on the move and talks are continuing.
West Ham's defence have taken the brunt of criticism after the first two matches of this season, but the lack of defensive cover in front of them has not helped.
Carvalho, who was outstanding in Portugal's victorious Euro 2016 campaign, would significantly help to fill that gap, along with the imminent return of Cheikhou Kouyate from injury.
With Sunderland keen on Robert Snodgrass and Newcastle being linked with a move for their former striker Andy Carroll, there could still be more West Ham transfer action before the window closes on Thursday week, with Ghana striker Abdul Majeed Waris being linked with a £12m move from French club Lorient.
One major positive for Bilic following the Southampton defeat was the form of Javier 'Chicharito' Hernandez, who scored both West Ham goals.
"It's almost impossible to mark Chicharito because he doesn't only have one movement and you can lose him," said the West Ham boss. "We are very pleased that he is our player. He was our target and it was a long shot but we never gave up on him.
"We had to fight with a few other clubs but we were delighted when we did it [the deal] because we knew what we were getting. He showed on Saturday what he is all about."
Bilic will be far less impressed by another of his new signings, Marko Arnautovic, following his red card for elbowing Jack Stephens.
The forward now misses three games and Bilic said: "I am not going to talk about the red card or the two penalties but I can say it was a big blow for the team to be let down and to play with 10 men for the majority of the game."
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WEST HAM TO HOLD SNODGRASS TALKS WITH SUNDERLAND
MICHAEL OLIVER @MichaelOIiver
ReadWestHam
West Ham are still trying to trim down their squad before the transfer window closes next week and Robert Snodgrass is the most likely candidate to leave the club.
Simon Grayson has been very public in his interest in signing Snodgrass having managed him at Leeds earlier in their respective careers but has ruled out a permanent move for the winger because he would be too expensive.
I can tell you now that we won't be buying Robert Snodgrass because of the fee and wages that come with it.
The only way we'll get him is a loan deal. There won't be too many clubs able to afford him in the Championship, if they can they have serious money. But he's a player I like and will ask the question about his availability, like a lot of other managers.
Snodgrass signed for West Ham in a £10.2m deal from Hull last January but has failed to impress during his time at the club at Slaven Bilic is keen to offload the Scotland international.
The Northern Echo report that talks between West Ham and the Championship club will take place in the next 24 hours to discuss a loan deal for Snodgrass, but Sunderland would be required to pay the majority of his £70,000-a-week wages.
Sunderland are one of the favourites to land Snodgrass this summer with the likes of Aston Villa and Newcastle also being linked with the former Norwich midfielder, and make use of these free bet offers if you plan on backing a transfer to go through before the window closes.
West Ham will look to replace Snodgrass with Brentford attacker Jota who is valued at £8m by the West London club.
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West Ham youngsters pull off superb comeback to beat Tottenham
BY LONDON FOOTBALL NEWS 21/08/2017
West Ham's youngsters pulled off a great comeback to win 3-2 at Tottenham on Monday after being two goals down at half-time. Dylan Duncan's deflected effort put the hosts ahead in the Premier League 2 game at Hotspur Way and they doubled their lead when Marcus Edwards netted with a penalty after being fouled by Tunji Akinola. The Hammers hit back after the break, with Vashon Neufville crossing for Dan Kemp to score before Nathan Holland curled in the equaliser And Akinola atoned for his earlier error by setting up Josh Pask for the winner. Arsenal's Under-21 side will play Manchester City's in a Premier League 2 game at the Emirates Stadium this evening.
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"Brutal attack" - former ref wants West Ham winger Arnautovic banned for five games
Arnautovic was rightly given his marching orders after an horrendous elbow at St Mary's
Football London
BYSAM INKERSOLE
09:06, 21 AUG 2017
Former Premier League referee Keith Hackett says Marko Arnautovic should be banned for five games after his "brutal" elbow on Jack Stephens as West Ham lost to Southampton on Saturday. The Hammers record signing was given a straight red card just past the half hour mark at St Mary's after clattering into the Saints defender and despite his protests, the Austrian can have absolutely no complaints over the decision. Arnautovic apologised to his team mates at half time and then to the Hammers fans post-game on Instagram following his dismissal, which will see him banned for at least three games anyway. However, giving his verdict on You Are The Ref, Hackett called for an immediate five-game ban for Arnautovic and for anyone else who is caught using their elbows and getting sent off. Hackett - who called Arnautovic's challenge "outrageous and brutal", said: "The referees failure to detect this challenge contributed to West Ham's Arnautovic deciding foolishly to take matters into his own hands by committing an outrageous brutal act, deliberately using his elbow on an opponent. "This should be a five match ban! It is my belief that at the moment we are witnessing too many challenges that are reckless and with excessive force. The PGMOL need to call a meeting with the Premier League, PFA and LMA to express their concerns so that everyone understands the seriousness of these challenges."
Hackett also complained about Mason missing a "blatant" red card for Mark Noble, who launched into a pretty awful, studs up challenge on Mario Lemina that went unpunished.
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A CANNED HISTORY OF LONDON STADIUM'S RETRACTABLE SEATING
By Sean Whetstone 20 Aug 2017 at 17:00
WTID
A plan to downsize the Olympic Stadium after the 2012 Games is "flawed" and "not in the interests of the East End", a London Assembly committee said way back in 2010 before the London 2012 Olympics were .
The then committee chairman and West Ham fan Len Duvall said the Olympic Park Legacy Company (OPLC) should have carried out an "open and thorough analysis" of various options earlier. He said: "Put simply, an elite 25,000-seat athletics stadium is not, and was never going to be, in the long-term interests of the East End or of the taxpayer"
Fast forward to 2013 and The London Legacy Development Corporation started its search for a contractor to deliver £20m retractable seating system at the former Olympic Stadium. The tender was eventually awarded to a company Alto Seating who designed the seating with SAPA UK providing the Aluminium retractable decks and GallowGlass tasked with the moving of the seats. It was originally budgeted around £300,000 to move the seats.
A case study on The Welding Institute website" "Sapa was contracted to provide seating decks as part of the redevelopment of London's Olympic Stadium, the centrepiece of the London Olympic Park and one of the venues for this year's Rugby World Cup. Sapa Extrusions, based in Harderwijk in the Netherlands, had to deliver 3500 retractable decks for the stadium.The seating decks were to be made from extruded aluminium, incorporating joints made using friction stir welding (FSW)."
In 2015 Primary contractor Alto Seating went into voluntary administration weeks before the Rugby World cup owing GallowGlass £712,000 and leaving SAPA to carry on the project alone.
In 2016 LLDC CEO, David Goldstone gave evidence at the London Assembly Budget Monitoring sub-committee about the rising cost of the London Stadium and the impact of the failed retractable seating system.He confirmed an extra £21m was spent on the doomed seating system last year and estimated costs could reach as high £8m per year to move the seats backwards and forward unless a better solution can be found.
Speaking about the increase Goldstone explained: "A chunk of it was to do with the very unfortunate failure of the seating contractor who had been hired to install new seating system that happened just before the Rugby world cup last summer. We were left with a partially installed system so we had to step in and make it ready for that event. The (retractable seating) had been a joint venture, one partner did the main design and another installed the system, one partner went bust and the other partner inherited it but wasn't a suitable long term contractor. They took it forward during 2016 but we had to settle out with them in 2016 because they weren't a suitable long term"
On the question of annual running costs of the retractable seating costing up to £8m per year to run Goldstone admitted that was an estimate of moving between football mode and athletics each year. He said it was an estimated cost but it was not a confirmed amount and they were in a tendering process at the moment for a long term operator to move the seats and they just received the tenders in at the last few days. Goldstone confirmed "We are not pretending it's not an issue but we know what the confirmed costs will be in the near future"
On 1st February 2017 Stadium owners E20 signed a five-year contract with PHD Modular Access Services Ltd of which Project 7 construction is part of their group.
Last month London Stadium seating contractors Project 7 construction published a video on youtube to show how the lower tier seats move from football mode to music concert mode. The video below shows seven rows of seats removed from the East stand before the West stand is pushed back section by section on air skates. The north and south lower stands are lifted and moved in modules by cranes. The north and south lower stands are lifted and moved in modules by crane with the video proudly claiming 500 unique crane lift movements are required for the operation. Possibly the most shocking fact of the whole video is the boast that it takes 32,000 man hours to achieve the full move.
Costs of the new contract have not been revealed despite a freedom of information request from myself but the quoted 32,000 hours at London Living Wage of £9.75 per hour would cost £312,000 per move so manpower would cost close to a million without the cost crane hire and associated costs factored in.
The new five-year seating contract can be viewed HERE
This week Project 8 was busy converting the London Stadium back to football mode following the completion of 2017 IAAF World Championships on Sunday.
Stadium owners E20 Stadium LLP are contractually obliged under the contract with West Ham to return the stadium to football mode by August 25th this year.
In a Freedom of Information response received this week, E20 Stadium says: "All four of the stadium's stands are scheduled to be in their football positions by the 25 August. The stadium will be ready for West Ham's first home match on 11 September 2017. Given that the stadium will be in football mode prior to West Ham's first home match, no breach is anticipated."
Long gone are the promises of 'State of the art retractable seating' which has since been rebranded as relocatable seating.
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RICE OR ROPE ? THINGS CAN AND WILL ONLY GET BETTER
By HamburgHammer 21 Aug 2017 at 08:00
WTID
Another subpar weekend football wise for me and also one that drove home the point again how bizarre football can be. While I don't particularly care about the exploits of Hamburg SV I still look out for their results by force of habit and because I want most Hamburg based teams to do well.
So what happened in HSV's league opener on Friday ? They scored the winning and only goal after 15 minutes already, but lost their goalscorer to injury in the process of celebrating that goal. The player apparently brushed the corner flag at an awkward angle and did his cruciate ligament which will result in him now being out for the first six months of the season.
As I said, bizarre!
Then came the West Ham game which has been discussed on here at length already. Quite a game it was too, with plenty of incidents, a brave fightback from our lads and a heartbreaking penalty decision right at the end. Then again, most teams will lose a game in which their record signing gets himself an early shower in the first half for stupidly elbowing an opponent in full view of the referee and in which they also concede two penalties.
It was pretty much a stereotypical West Ham game, some rush to the blood, some fight and guts, some clumsiness, basically shooting yourself in the foot while also rarely getting the rub of the green. I wasn't happy with the defeat because Southampton were there for the taking. Then again we are still missing some key players like Lanzini, Kouyate and Carroll (who may be Newcastle bound after all if you believe the latest rumours).
I choose to focus on the positives though. Young Declan Rice had another good game and showed maturity beyond his years. The reaction of our players in this game filled with adversity was nothing but positive, in no short measure helped by the fox in the box qualities of our Little Pea Chicharito. We finally have a proper finisher in our ranks who will get 20 goals a season easily, provided he gets the right service and manages to stay healthy and injury free.
I reckon there will be plenty of movement still in this transfer window, both in terms of players in (Carvalho/Jota/another CB) and out (Snodgrass/Carroll/Obiang ?), but first and foremost we really need to work hard in training to make sure our players defend a lot better as a unit, not just the defenders but the entire team. I am always impressed whenever a team is on the move all the time during a game, running, chasing, closing opposition players down, we need a lot more of that and if that means a different training routine or fitness regime, then so be it.
You know I have always been a massive Bilic fan and I still am. But I am not blinkered enough to ignore the fact that a manager will not remain in his job for long if his teams concede 3 or 4 goals on a regular basis. Of course the mistakes are essentially down to the players on the pitch, but Bilic needs to make sure the players are sharp and focused when they are stepping out onto that pitch, we need to cut down the number of mistakes in our games drastically.
Is it possible that maybe Bilic is too much of a mate with his players, too much of a Mr.Nice Guy ? That can work well with a certain group of players. Others may exploit that kind of laissez faire attitude though or respond in a manner not conducive to successful football. As Bilic's job is on the line this season too, with him being in the final year of his contract, I feel he has no other chance than to develop a more ruthless streak with players.
No reason for us fans though to fetch some rope to hang ourselves just yet or run a hot bath with the hairdryer sitting on the edge nearby. It's been a bad start to the season, granted, but in all honesty, did we expect anything else when the fixture list was released ? The preseason games didn't exactly fill me with confidence either, but the best way for our players to gain confidence is by winning games when it counts. Let's win a few and watch the confidence return and grow among our squad.
Starting with the Cup game at Cheltenham and yet another away game at Newcastle. I am so relieved that our games will ALWAYS take priority over everything else that happens at the London Stadium…;-))
Quick Concordia update. Yesterday brought a highly frustrating 1:1 draw at home to Victoria Hamburg and the game bore a few similarities to the West Ham game the day before.
There was a red card (second yellow) which led to Concordia having a man advantage for the last 20 minutes, being 1:0 up already at this point. At that stage you would have expected the home team to calmly dominate possession, maybe add another goal or two to put the game to bed. But Cordi for some unexplainable reason decided to ignore the man advantage, just sitting deep instead, letting Victoria have plenty of the ball to really push for the equaliser with ten men.
And indeed they scored from a very dodgy penalty just a few minutes before the final whistle. I always thought it couldn't be a penalty if the goalkeeper clearly got to the ball first with his gloves and holding on to it.
Yet the striker went down after clashing with the goalkeeper who, remember, had already reached and secured the ball with both hands before making contact with the attacker. I have rarely seen a dodgier penalty being given, but, just like West Ham, Concordia shot themselves in the foot by not winning the game earlier, making the man advantage count when they had the chance. Yes, the referee was a stubborn old Custard, strutting around the pitch like a peacock on his stag night, but the lads shouldn't have allowed a situation to develop giving the referee the opportunity to point towards the spot.
Very disappointing – instead of being in the promotion chasing pack Cordi are now already firmly rooted in the bottom third of the table after four games played. The great thing for both of my teams of course is: From where we are things can only get better, the only way is up. How far and how quickly ? We'll see. COYI!
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Slaven Bilic not planning defensive reinforcements despite West Ham's frailties
Nick Szczepanik , st mary's
20 AUGUST 2017 • 10:30PM
Telegraph.co.uk
The signing of William Carvalho, the Portugal holding midfield player, from Sporting CP of Lisbon cannot come soon enough for West Ham United. Slaven Bilic, the Hammers' manager, spoke enthusiastically after the 3-2 defeat at Southampton about the performance of £16m signing Javier Hernandez, who had scored twice. But the team's defending means that Hernandez may have to net a hat-trick in every game if his goals are to secure any points.
West Ham have now conceded seven times in two games, and although they will not be the last team to let four in at Old Trafford, as they did on the opening day of the season, three at St Mary's, where Saints had not scored in their previous six games, is a different matter.
As a former international defender, Bilic must be very concerned. True, Bilic lost Winston Reid, arguably his best defender, to a calf injury in the pre-match warm up, and Marko Arnautovic's ugly elbowing of Jack Stephens left West Ham a man short for an hour.
But Nathan Redmond was given five yards of space by Pablo Zabaleta in which to control a pass from Manolo Gabbiadini and return the ball to him for Southampton's first goal. Gabbiadini had run alone from the centre circle to the penalty area to receive Redmond's pass on the blind side of former Saints captain Jose Fonte. At the very least, the considerable physical presence of Carvalho would make such runs longer and more hazardous for opponents.
Fonte was at fault again for the second goal, pulling back Steve Davis to concede a penalty after his initial challenge on the Northern Ireland midfield player failed to win the ball. But again, nobody had tracked Davis or put any pressure on the pass to him. Dusan Tadic has a poor record from the penalty spot and hit his kick straight at Joe Hart, fortunate that the ball went in anyway off the goalkeeper's legs. But if it had rebounded, only Aaron Cresswell was following up and Tadic would have had a simple and unchallenged tap-in.
The third goal was almost unforgivable bearing in mind how hard West Ham had previously fought to level the match. James Ward-Prowse's diagonal cross – unchallenged of course, even in injury time - should have been meat and drink for any Premier League central defender. Fonte, however, was ball-watching and allowed Maya Yoshida to attack the space behind him. Zabaleta, with the best view of the situation, decided on the risky strategy of nudging Yoshida rather than defending the cross properly.
The gamble did not pay off. Again it was a penalty and again only one West Ham player followed up in case Charlie's Austin's kick had been saved or hit the post. Austin suggested that West Ham captain Mark Noble had even helped him by claiming, in an eventually self-destructive piece of gamesmanship, that Hart knew which way the kick would go. Austin changed his mind and scored.
"I've got to be honest, I think we got out of jail," Austin said. "Whether it was a penalty or not, I don't know. I think if went against us, it's a harsh one. But that doesn't matter for us, it's three points."
To some extent, it does not matter for West Ham either - the important thing is to prevent such situations from developing. Carvalho should help there but Bilic does not plan to upgrade elsewhere. "We have enough centre backs in our team, if they stay fit of course," he said. What is it they say about quality, not quantity?
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Are Slaven Bilić's Training Methods Causing West Ham's Slow Start?
Posted by Jack Coogan | Published on August 20, 2017
Fronthestands.co.uk
Under Slaven Bilić, West Ham have continuously gotten off to slow starts. In 2015/16 the Hammers did beat Arsenal 2-0 on the opening day, but proceeded to lose to Leicester and Bournemouth at home in back to back weeks, conceding six goals in the process. During the 2016/17 season, West Ham won only one of their first seven matches, conceding 17 goals over those seven games. Now this season, Bilić's men have conceded seven in the opening two games, losing them both. But, why does this seem to be a recurring theme for the Irons under the Croatian's leadership?
Embed from Getty Images
Many have pointed out the fact that West Ham have often looked unfit at the start of the season over the past few years. This is especially relevant for the past two seasons. During the 2016/17 campaign, the Hammers conceded 17 goals after the 75th minute, that's 26% of the goals they conceded. Only two teams who weren't relegated conceded more that late in matches. Now the Irons have already conceded three goals after the 75th minute, only two matches in. This has caused many to question Bilić's training methods, and rightly so.
These aren't just random hypothesis' either, many players who have left the club on loan have stated that training was much more rigorous at their new club. Last season, when Reading took Oxford out on loan, Jaap Stam claimed that the young defender had been surprised at the intensity of training at the club. Reading's manager was quoted saying, "Reece Oxford has been surprised at the level of intensity in training at Reading, compared to at West Ham."
This isn't the only incident of this happening either. Last season when Enner Valencia was sent on loan to Everton, the Ecuadorian also had a lot to say about the Hammers' training methods. In one of Valencia's first interview's at Everton, he told the media, "I have enjoyed training with my new team-mates, it's different to my last team – it is a little bit harder." This is only two incidents indicating that West Ham's training methods aren't up to par with other teams, but there are most likely many more who have not said anything.
During the Hammers' pre-season training camp in Germany, the intensity in training was reportedly being upped by not the manager Slaven Bilić, but by summer signings Joe Hart and Pablo Zabaleta. It is a very worrying sign for West Ham that more experienced players feel the need to take it on themselves to make training harder and more intense.
This is also the second season in a row that West Ham have started with multiple key players out injured. Last season the Hammers had key players such as Dimitri Payet, Sofiane Feghouli, André Ayew, Andy Carroll, Manuel Lanzini, and Angelo Ogbonna miss significant time in August. These injuries woes have continued this season, with Michail Antonio, Manuel Lanzini, Andy Carroll, and Cheikhou Kouyaté all missing time this August.
Embed from Getty Images
That's without mentioning that Winston Reid left pre-game warmups against Southampton on a stretcher earlier today. These injury problems are not just bad luck either. Last season, West Ham led the league in injuries, allocating 82 over the course of the campaign. The Irons were the only club to have more than 40 injuries lasting 14 or more days.
It's not hard to see that Bilić's coaching staff plays a massive part in West Ham's recurring slow starts. With the amount of injuries the Irons have to start off with each season makes it extremely hard for the club to get results against relatively healthy squads early on in the season. Something needs to change at West Ham, or these slow starts will become an even more repetitive theme for the Hammers than they already are.
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http://vyperz.blogspot.com
Tuesday, August 22
Sunday, August 20
Daily WHUFC News - 22nd August 017
Late penalty breaks West Ham United's hearts in defeat at Southampton
WHUFC.com
Two goals from summer signing Chicharito was not enough for West Ham United to claim their first points of their season as the Irons fell to a 3-2 defeat at Southampton.
The Hammers appeared set for another tough afternoon on the road as goals from Marco Gabbiadini and Dusan Tadic put the Saints 2-0 up either side of a Marko Arnautovic red card.
Javier Hernandez was on hand to tuck in Michail Antonio's saved effort on the stroke of half-time before the No17 again proved his goalscoring prowess in the second period, knocking home after Fraser Forster saved a Diafra Sakho header.
However Southampton were awarded another penalty in the last minute of the match, from which Charlie Austin scored to give the hosts the win.
The Irons started the afternoon with difficulty before the contest even began as Winston Reid – who signed a new deal at the London Stadium on Friday– was ruled out in the warm-up due to a calf injury. Angelo Ogbonna came into the side in his place.
Despite West Ham United having the best early chances at St Mary's through Arnautovic and Michail Antonio, it was the Saints that took the lead on Eleven minutes as Gabbiadini slotted home after an exchange with Nathan Redmond.
Antonio looked tricky and moved the Hammers into dangerous territory but West Ham's afternoon was made much more difficult after a straight red card for Arnautovic.
The Serbian No7 was given his marching orders after a clash with defender Jack Stephens in the 33rd minute and Southampton doubled their lead just four minutes later from the penalty spot.
Ogbonna was adjudged to have brought down Steven Davis in the area and Dusan Tadic saw his spot-kick find the net via Joe Hart's feet.
Slaven Bilic's side were however given hope going into the second half after some brilliant work from Antonio saw the No30 get a shot on goal. The effort could only be parried by Fraser Forster, allowing Chicharito to sweep home his first goal for the Hammers.
Forster was again called into action early in the second period as Hernandez's teasing ball into Antonio could only be palmed out for a corner. Andre Ayew then saw a headed effort blocked by Stephens, although some calls suggested the ball had made contact with his upper arm.
Hernandez continued to prove a thorn in Southampton's side as the Mexican saw a tantalising effort on the half-volley swerve agonisingly wide of the home team's goal.
Gabbiadini came close to his second for the hosts after rattling the crossbar from 35 yards while Joe Hart was called into action twice in quick succession, making two difficult saves just after the hour mark.
Bilic made two changes half-way through the second period with Edimilson Fernandes and Diafra Sakho taking to the field in place of Antonio and Ayew, and the latter had a big hand in West Ham's equaliser.
Aaron Cresswell delivered a delicious ball into the box, from which Sakho saw his header palmed onto the cross-bar, and Chicharito was again on hand to finish the rebound and draw the Hammers level.
However Southampton were awarded another penalty in the closing moments of the game, after Pablo Zabaleta was ruled to have committed a foul, which substitute Charlie Austin tucked away.
Southampton: Forster; Cedric, Yoshida, Stephens, Bertrand; Davis (Long 80'), Romeu, Lemina (Ward-Prowse 64'), Redmond, Tadic; Gabbiadini (Austin 80')
Subs not used: McCarthy, Bednarek, McQueen, Boufal
Goals: Gabbiadini 11', Tadic (p) 38', Austin (p) 90'
West Ham: Hart; Zabaleta, Fonte, Ogbonna, Cresswell; Rice (Obiang 76'), Noble, Antonio (Sakho 67'), Ayew (Fernandes 67'), Arnautovic (s/o 33'), Hernandez
Subs not used: Adrian, Byram, Masuaku
Goals: Hernandez 45', 73'
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Bilic praises ten-man Hammers for Southampton spirit
WHUFC.com
Slaven Bilic focused on praising his players instead of criticising the match official after ten-man West Ham United came within a whisker of a courageous draw at Southampton.
The Hammers fell a goal down to Manolo Gabbiadini's early finish before losing Marko Arnautovic to a red card after the Austrian was adjudged to have elbowed Jack Stephens by referee Lee Mason.
Mr Mason then awarded a penalty for Jose Fonte's foul on Steven Davis before two Chicharito goals either side of half-time hauled the visitors level at St Mary's Stadium.
West Ham, who had seen their own penalty claims turned down when Stephens appeared to handle Andre Ayew's header, then conceded a second spot-kick in added time, when Pablo Zabaleta was penalised for a nudge on Maya Yoshida, enabling substitute Charlie Austin to break Claret and Blue hearts.
"We showed character and we showed quality and we showed that we could cope with ten men and we could score two goals and stop them from scoring," Bilic observed, when asked to sum up his team's performance.
"To be fair, we started off so good, we had two or three chances to take the lead and we didn't, so we were very disappointed to lose in the end."
One player who had every right to feel disappointed was Chicharito, who scored two typically predatory goals – his first for the Club following his summer move from Bayer Leverkusen – to drag his short-handed team level.
"He is a goalscorer but if we're also talking about him we must also talk about the second half, when we asked him to play on the wing because we needed to use his legs," he observed.
"We had to have two banks of four and sometimes defend with six when they attacked with their full-backs, so we have to praise him not only for his goals but also for his great attitude and great defensive work."
While he was proud of his players' performance, the manager simply would not be drawn on whether the major decisions had gone against his side on the south coast.
"I don't want to talk about the penalty decisions, because there is no point talking about it. I only want to say that I'm very proud of my team and they showed everything I said – commitment, quality, character, team spirit and we never gave up.
"I don't want to talk about the red card, either. I am the manager and I want to talk about the game and the decisions are going to lead to someone else talking about it. Of course the player is disappointed, but I am going to talk about the quality of the game and not about the decisions.
"It's very hard to play with ten men, especially as we were already one goal down. We then conceded a second goal and it was difficult to come back. On paper it was very difficult to keep it to 2-0, but we showed character and commitment and that we are fit enough to do it for each other.
"As soon as we equalised, we defended how you are meant to defend, very deep, and we waited for our chances and we got them. It was our gameplan at half-time and unfortunately we conceded a third one late on."
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Chicharito: West Ham can take positives from Southampton defeat
WHUFC.com
Chicharito believes West Ham United can take heart from a spirited fightback despite ultimately losing 3-2 at Southampton.
Javier Hernandez scored his first two Premier League goals for the Hammers on Saturday to bring Slaven Bilic's side back level after the Saints took a 2-0 lead.
If not for a debatable penalty decision in the 90th minute – which Charlie Austin tucked away – the Irons would have left St Mary's with a well-earned point.
But Chicharito believes West Ham United's true ability was shown with the comeback, and the spirit from this is the key factor for the team to remember rather than the heartbreak of the defeat.
"I will take confidence from my goals," Hernandez said: "They show the character of this team. We never give up and we tried to improve as much as we can following the last game [the loss to Manchester United].
"I'm happy that I scored two goals. You need to look on the bright side, at the positive things. Getting off the mark gives me motivation and it gives me confidence."
The Mexican admitted that he and his West Ham teammates were frustrated by a couple of refereeing decisions but feels the side can also take positives from their performance with ten men, after Marko Arnautovic was shown a red card in the first half.
It was after Arnautovic's dismissal that the Irons scored their two goals. Hernandez was on hand to tuck home after Michail Antonio's shot was saved, and was again in the right place to score following a Diafra Sakho header that was palmed onto the crossbar.
"When you're playing most of the game with ten men it's really frustrating," Hernandez conceded: "But we came back.
"It is very hard to play with just ten men. With eleven men it's hard so with ten it's very, very hard. We did it pretty well and we were drawing the game.
"Sometimes we make mistakes. It's very frustrating because we played a good game after the sending off. We need to move forward."
Moving forward means looking to West Ham United's Carabao Cup contest with Cheltenham Town on Wednesday evening.
Chicharito will be hoping to once again get on the scoresheet in the cup match this week as Slaven Bilic's side look to progress into the third round of the tournament.
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Antonio: We've just got to move forward
WHUFC.com
Michail Antonio believes West Ham United can take huge heart from their performance at Southampton.
The Hammers fell two goals down and lost Marko Arnautovic to a first-half red card, before roaring back through a brace of superb finishes from Chicharito, only for Charlie Austin's last-gasp penalty to break Claret and Blue hearts.
Antonio himself produced an all-action display on his return from four months out with a hamstring injury, reminding everyone of his power and ability to fashion chances out of nothing.
"It was devastating, really, we managed to get back to 2-2 from 2-0 down, but what a way to lose it!" said the No30, whose shot led to Chicharito's first goal on the stroke of half-time.
"I'm not going to make any comments about what actually happened, but the boys were devastated to lose it and we are just going to have to pick ourselves up and go again.
"There were loads of positives we can take from the game, especially from the second half, so we're going to take them away and get ready for Newcastle.
"There is lots of frustration. The boys are still in the dressing room now and all talking about it, saying they can't believe what's actually happened. I don't really know what you want me to say!"
Antonio was among those hugely impressed by the impact made by Chicharito, who reacted quickest on two occasions to finish clinically after Fraser Forster had saves from the winger and Diafra Sakho respectively.
"What a massive purchase we've got in Chicharito!" he exclaimed. "He is a fox in the box and he has shown the quality of player we have managed to bring in.
"We have just got to move forward. I'm getting back to my fitness and I'm starting to look sharp like I was at the beginning of last season, so hopefully I can keep progressing with that and start putting the ball in the back of the net."
The belief West Ham showed to draw level when the odds were stacked against them impressed Antonio, who insisted there is absolutely nothing wrong with the spirit in the camp, despite the fact they have now lost their opening two Premier League matches
"It shows there is nothing wrong in the camp, that we all believe in each other as we kept pushing forward and slinging balls in the box," he said.
"Basically, we had two balls which deflected and Chicha was in the right spot because he's a fox. Hopefully we can keep putting balls in the box and he can keep scoring goals."
Next up is a trip to newly-promoted Newcastle United and Antonio is sure the Hammers can get off the mark at St James' Park.
"We will be three games into the season and we need to get some points on the board, then we have Huddersfield at home and the season can start from there," he said.
He saved his final word for the Claret and Blue Army, who created a superb atmosphere at St Mary's Stadium with their non-stop singing and support for their team, even when circumstances were conspiring against them.
"They were the atmosphere," he observed. "They helped, they pushed us and managed to get us back into the game and the penalty just took it away from them in the final minutes of the game."
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5/7 shots on target: How Chicharito & Antonio impressed v Southampton
WHUFC.com
Despite suffering a late loss to Southampton on Saturday West Ham United can still take positives from the contest on the south coast.
Chicharito got his first two Premier League goals for the Hammers since signing this summer and the fixture also saw the return of Michail Antonio to action, who looked lively until his substitution midway through the second period.
Both players deserve praise for their efforts in the fixture on the south coast with each showing in their statistics just how strong their respective performances were.
Javier Hernandez's two goals in the contest both came after Fraser Forster had made initial saves, from Antonio and Diafra Sakho, and the Mexican's brace was netted with his only two shots on target in the fixture.
The No17 only attempted one more effort on goal in the entire game – a swerving half-volley which went narrowly wide – meaning Chicharito scored twice from three shots in this match.
Chicharito also did his duty defensively, making two defensive actions in the fixture in the form of an interception and a clearance.
Interestingly the striker didn't spent too long in possession, and his two attempts at take-ons did not succeed, but Hernandez's impact was still crucial for Slaven Bilic's side.
Hernandez also created two chances for his teammates, an amount that was equalled by Antonio.
The No30 missed the opening day contest with Manchester United but returned to the starting XI on Saturday, reminding the West Ham United faithful of his pace, power and ability.
Although Antonio couldn't get a goal he did test Forster on a number of occasions, seeing three of his four shots hit the target and put pressure on the Southampton shot-stopper.
The former Saints winger was a force in the air for West Ham United, winning six of his nine aerial duels during his 67 minutes on the field. Antonio also left Southampton defenders in his wake with his speed, succeeding with each of his four-attempted take-ons.
Antonio put serious pressure on the right-flank and gave Ryan Bertrand a seriously tough test for the Saints, and also exerted his pace up front as he and Hernandez fluidly switched throughout the contest.
Although the result ended in a defeat West Ham United supporters can take great comfort in how Chicharito and Antonio performed, and can now look to next week's matches against Cheltenham Town and Newcastle United with excitement at what the talented duo do next.
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SOUTHAMPTON 3-2 WEST HAM – MATCH REPORT
AUTHOR: BRIAN KNOX. PUBLISHED: 20 AUGUST 2017 AT 1:52PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Match Report by @WestHamAmerican
West Ham fell at St. Mary's today 3-2 in an up-and-down match that saw both moments of brilliance for the currently homeless Hammers, and moments of indiscipline, which cost West Ham the match. Slavin Bilic's side completely had the wheels come off late during last Sunday's opener at Old Trafford. (Swansea fell victim to the same fate today) And it looked as if the Manchester United hangover would continue today, as West Ham's opening half almost went as poorly as possible.
West Ham found themselves 2-0 down, and down to 10 men after 38 minutes due to Manolo Gabbiadini's opening goal and a Dusan Tadic penalty kick; which along with Marko Arnautovic's red card in the early minutes of play, showed the worst opening moments any Hammer supporter could hope for. This doesn't even include Winston Reid being stretchered off the pitch during opening warm-ups, suffering from some form of calf injury.
Michael Antonio and Havier Hernandez finally gave the vocal West Ham visiting fans something to cheer about in the 44th with Antonio's shot from the edge of the box earning a save from Forster, but Chicharito cleaning up the rebound. With a 2-1 deficit and only ten men, securing at least a point looked challenging, but momentum was on West Ham's side.
That momentum carried over into the 73rd minute when one of Aaron Cresswell's signature crosses found the head of Diafra Sakho, but his header met the crossbar. Once again Hernandez was present to strike the rebound into the roof of the net. With the match at 2-2, and Chicharito sporting a brace, Bilic looked to hang on and at least collect at least a point.
However, three minutes into the stoppage time, Pablo Zabelta, with Jose Fonte, clumsily brought down Maya Yoshida, as the defender chased James Ward-Prowse's cross, giving Southampton another penalty and Charlie Austin left no doubt as he scored the game winner.
As devastating as this result was, there were some bright spots. Obviously, Hernandez's scoring ability seems as strong as advertised. The return of Antonio was a success. Hopefully having Kouyate, Carroll, and Lanzini back in action will open up the West Ham attack to where Chicharito will have more opportunities.
During the match, the lack of discipline was stunning. While Zabaleta and Arnautovic are new to the club, Bilic will have to direct his starters to keep their heads about them. Last season West Ham was the most red carded side in the league. This league is unforgiving enough without playing almost an entire match with ten men.
Hopefully as the summer transfer window comes to a close, the club's position at the bottom of the table will not turn away any of the prominent targets we have bid on during the final two weeks. The board have made some great moves and once this team is at full strength, the wins will come. West Ham were the better team today, but with two spot kicks and a red card, it is nearly impossible to win anything as a visiting club. It will be interesting to see how Bilic selects for the midweek League Cup match. While this team is in desperate need of a victory, it can ill-afford to suffer any more prominent injuries. Stay tuned to The West Ham Way for all the information as the summer transfer window comes to a close.
Saints: Forster, Soares, Bertrand, Yoshida, Stephens, Davis, Tadic, Romeu, Lemina, Gabbiadini, Redmond.
Substitutes: McCarthy, Bednarek, McQueen, Ward-Prowse, Boufal, Long, Austin.
West Ham: Hart, Reid, Cresswell, Fonte, Zabaleta, Rice, Arnautovic, Noble, Antonio, Ayew, Chicharito.
Substitutes:Adrian, Byram, Masuaku, Ogbonna, Obiang, Fernandes, Sakho
Referee: Lee Mason
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REF WATCH: LEE MASON – SOUTHAMPTON VS WEST HAM
AUTHOR: SAMTWHWREF. PUBLISHED: 19 AUGUST 2017 AT 8:59PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by SamRoyden
After receiving the biggest defeat on the opening day of the Premier League in 11 years, West Ham needed to kick start the season at Southampton who haven't scored in 9 fixtures at St Mary's. Slaven Bilić gave youngster Declan Rice his first Premier League start in a changed team which saw Michail Antonio break into the starting 11 after returning from a hamstring injury.
The referee appointed for his gameweek 2 fixture was Lee Mason. Mason hasn't bathed himself in glory over the last couple of seasons with wayward and controversial decision making. This fixture was Mason's first Premier League fixture of the season after being appointment Cardiff vs Sheffield United in the Championship last week.
During the first half, Lee Mason had a number of high profile decisions that needed to be made which was meant an incident packed first 45 minutes. In the first 20 minutes, I thought that Mason was in control but the game very quickly got away from him. The first big decision Mason had to make was when Dušan Tadić clattered into Javier Hernandez on the half way line making no attempt to play the ball. When looking at the challenge, it's reckless. Tadić completely misjudged his challenge and in my opinion was rightly cautioned. There were calls for a red card and if the Southampton man caught Hernandez with either foot or leg, I would have expected Mason to show Tadić a red card.
Ultimately, the deciding factor was whether the players safety was at risk or not and it's something I think about during every decision. As I mentioned above, the challenge was reckless, Tadić used his body and in the Laws of The Game, a challenge of this reckless sort is warranted with a caution. If Tadić caught the Mexican, leading with his foot or leg, this would have been excessive force and this would warrant a red card.
Lee Mason had a very interesting 30 seconds midway through the first half after missing two fouls where both players subsequently should have taken disciplinary action. Marko Arnautović was on the receiving end of an elbow to the newly signed midfielder Mario Lemina after both players went up to challenge for the ball. In my opinion, this was a foul as Lemina caught Arnautović but it was unintentional and was for leverage to jump instead of trying to endanger. Mason's decision making on this incident bothered me for two reasons: Firstly, was that it was a foul and Lemina should have been cautioned and secondly Arnautović sustained a head injury and the game should have been stopped. Lee Mason failed to do either of these which is poor decision making by the referee.
While Arnautović was on the floor injured, Mark Noble stupidly went into a challenge two footed with Mario Lemina who committed to a sliding challenge. Mark Noble caught the Southampton midfielder high on the shin and Lee Mason completely missed this challenge and eventually blew for Arnautović to receive treatment. In my opinion, Mark Noble should have been sent off as it was a very poor challenge as he used excessive force. Noble was very lucky to be on the field and this was another decision Lee Mason failed to see.
Marko Arnautović always had a bad temperament which we saw in his Stoke days on a couple of occasions and his actions during the game was completely stupid and unnecessary. After the ball had gone by Jack Stephens, Arnautović struck the Southampton defender with his elbow in the neck region. Lee Mason and his assistant referee got this decision spot on and Arnautović should have no complaints. This is a stupid challenge by Arnautović and therefore he will miss the next three games for violent conduct
The misery continued for West Ham as José Fonte conceded a penalty for blatantly pulling back Stephen Davis. This was a stone wall penalty and Mason was on hand to award it. Fonte wasn't cautioned for his attempt to stop Davis from controlling the ball inside the area but should have been given a caution for this but Mason chose not too. Even though Fonte made no genuine attempt to play the ball, it wasn't an obvious goalscoring opportunity so it wouldn't have been a red card offence.
The second half for Lee Mason was a lot quieter than the first but he continued to have game-changing decisions to make. The first decision Mason had to make was whether Jack Stephens intentionally handled the ball or not after Ayew's header struck the defenders arm. There is no doubt that Andre Ayew's header hit Stephens on the arm; From my first view it appeared that his arm was in a natural position but I've seen these given. I do have to question Lee Mason's positioning for the corner. Mason was positioned on the edge of the D on the penalty area. Mason should have been nearer to the corner of the 18 yards box so his vision could not be impaired and to allow your assistant referee to look along his line of sight. Upon replays, it was clear that Mason's view was obstructed and he couldn't have given a decision as he couldn't see it. Positioning is taught very early in a refereeing career, especially for set pieces which allow your assistant referee to look across the line and for the referee to look into the crowd of players to give you, as the referee, the best opportunity to give a decision. It's strange that Mason took this position and he was guilty of taking other strange positioning throughout the game.
I've said before that goalkeepers are over protected by officials but I thought Mason got the decision to disallow the Southampton goal correct. As the ball ricocheted in the air, West Ham goalkeeper Joe Hart was poised to jump and collect/challenge for the ball but as Hart was about to jump, Nathan Redmond barged into the England number one and the goal was correctly disallowed.
I thought that Lee Mason had an average performance, with a handful of mistakes and a terrible 30 seconds in the first half but overall his performance was overshadowed by a very soft 91st minute penalty decision for Southampton's second penalty of the game. Southampton defender Maya Yoshida went down under minimal pressure by West Ham's Pablo Zabaleta whilst trying to latch on to a Ward-Prowse cross. Lee Mason pointed straight to the spot with West Ham players bewildered with his decision and cautioning Zabaleta in the process. Firstly, it was clear that Mason's position was poor once again as he took up a position which didn't give him a side on view of the challenge. Secondly, admittedly there was pressure from Zabaleta but there wasn't enough to give a foul in my opinion. If this incident occurred anywhere else on the pitch, it would not be classed as a foul. Thirdly, and more frustrating from a fans perspective, Zabaleta gave Lee Mason a decision to make in the final seconds of normal time. He should be experienced enough not to do that which Bilić will be furious about.
West Ham now sit rock bottom of the Premier League after two games. For the last 30 minutes of the game, I thought we looked comfortable and gunning for a draw with two great goals from Javier Hernandez. Since his sending off, Marko Arnautović has apologised on Instagram but his stupidity means he will be absent for three games against Cheltenham, Newcastle and the first home game of the season against Huddersfield. This kind of attitude and lack of self control cannot be tolerated and it put us in a difficult position for the rest of the game. Our defence is looking very suspect already after conceding 7 goals in two games. The amount of space that we gave Southampton in the middle of the park was a concern. There was no urgency in the middle of the park to put pressure on Southampton and time after time they split our defence with balls through midfield and defence just like Manolo Gabbiadini.
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A REFLECTION ON SOUTHAMPTON
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 20 AUGUST 2017 AT 10:04PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by Leon Shearing @leonshearing
Firstly I'd like to thank ex for the opportunity to write this article. To even be considered is an honour in itself. Cheers ex.
Wow, where do I start. A rollercoaster of a day but then we are all used to that following our beloved hammers.
It starts early 5:45 (no need for an alarm) as I awake eagerly anticipating another West Ham away day. We hit the road at 8:30 to meet with the rest of the lads I attend games with. I don't know why but I still get overly excited about going to watch West Ham. It's not all about the football but about the build up to the game, the company you keep, the other fans you meet and discuss your opinions with, learn their views and the new friends you make along your way. There really are some great characters you come across sporting the famous claret and blue. Southampton is one away day that I look forward to more than most. We take over yates' each time we are down the south coast. The place gradually fills by the minute with the claret and blue army turning up in their droves to support their idols and the atmosphere is building. By around midday the beer is flowing the place is buzzing and jam packed. People laughing, joking and generally having a good time. Choruses of bubbles ring out around the boozer and everywhere you look there is a fellow hammer singing their heart out. There are blokes wearing Mexican football shirts, sombreros and taches in honour of our little pea who I'm sure will become a cult hero. After a few more pints we take the short down the hill to St Mary's stadium which is a ground I quite like. It holds good memories for me as it is the place where I took my daughter for her first away game last season, a 1-3 win which I'm certain you all remember, shame that result couldn't be repeated yesterday.
On learning the starting 11 I had mixed views with Slav's selections. Fonte coming in for Ogbonna, I don't really rate Fonte that highly. He was brought into the club in January as cover for Ogbonna as he had been playing with an injury for a period of time. I think it's fair to say that Fonte hasn't lived up to the expectations of our loyal fans. My preferred centre back pairing in a flat 4 is Reid and Ogbonna. For me Ginge is above Fonte in the pecking order as for me he is a no nonsense centre half that gets the job done, is reliable and gives his all for the shirt.
Reid being stretchered off in the warm up was a huge blow for us. He is the best centre back at the club in my opinion and I for one hope that the injury isn't too serious and he is back fit sooner rather than later.
Cresswell coming in for Masuaku was a no brainer. I rate both our left backs but Arthur didn't exactly cover himself in glory at Old Trafford a week ago. I'm sure you have all seen the footage of his shenanigans in the lead up to Lukaku's second goal and that doesn't sit well with me or most if not all of you I'm sure.
Declan Rice coming in for Obiang was harsh in my opinion. Although Obiang wasn't great last week he was one of our stand out performers last term and he can feel aggrieved to have been left out. Having said that I do feel that Rice has earned his chance and I'm all for giving the youth their shot, after all we are the academy of football.
This maybe controversial but lots were singing his praises after his substitute performance against Man Utd last week, but coming in when you are 2-0 down and the game effectively lost wasn't too difficult. Man Utd didn't need to press the game so there was lots of time and space for Declan to do his thing. I'm not in anyway trying to say he didn't look impressive, I'm just trying to look at the bigger picture. From what I have heard and seen of the young man in the media and on the pitch I think he has a very bright future ahead of him and we may have a future star on our hands.
To have Antonio back is a great boost for the club and the fans. He us a favourite in the terraces and rightly so. He offers something that no one else at the club does and I don't mean his crazy goal celebrations. He is quick and ridiculously strong on the ball. His unpredictability is a great asset. I love how he is always positive and direct. I feel pace is something that we lack massively. The modern game is all about pace and a lot of goals are scored from fast counter attacking football especially in the premier league. I feel that we move the ball too slowly the vast majority of the time which when breaking gives the opposition time to get numbers back behind the ball. This is why I believe Antonio is vital to our football club.
After watching yesterday's game and the defeat at Old Trafford last week we seem to be lacking on the fitness front, this I believe has been an issue for us for some time, stretching back to last season. The match sharpness will come I get that. There is fit and then there is match fit but we seem to be a couple of yards of the pace. There was numerous times yesterday that we wasn't even close to winning the "second ball" which obviously invites pressure. It's difficult to do this with 10 men I understand that but to lose out on it so many occasions tells me it is an issue. I hope this is something that Slav and his staff have picked up on and it will he addressed.
I'm hearing and reading a lot of "Slav has got "x" amount of games to sort it out or he has to go"
The board gave decided that he is the man for the job so for me this talk is crazy and frankly a little over the top for this early in the season. I mean what would be the point of working with the manager over the close season on a shortlist of players that he wants at the club, backing him with the funds to get the personnel in and then not giving him time to work with the new recruits. We have moved deadwood on and got in some very good players. With a little under 2 weeks remaining in this window I don't think and hope that our business is concluded. The squad is beginning to gain depth something if which I don't believe we have had for a very long time.
Give Antonio and some of the fringe players a crack in mid week for the league cup tie and with Lanzini, Kouyate and Carroll hopefully in contention for Newcastle in the league next weekend things can only get better.
We move on together COYI
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Carvalho injured - or refusing to train?
KUMB.com
Filed: Friday, 18th August 2017
By: Staff Writer
Hammers target William Carvalho has failed to report for training with his current club this week - boosting rumours that he may yet be on his way to West Ham.
The defensive midfielder was the subject of a bid in the region of €30million by West Ham last week, since when the two clubs have been haggling over a the price (with an agreement yet to be reached).
However reports from Lisbon today suggest that Carvalho may be deliberately missing training in an attempt to push through a move to the Premier League.
Although he was unavailable for the Champions League game against Steaua Bucharest in midweek due to suspension and a purported shoulder problem, local news outlet Correio da Manhã claimed today that the 25-year-old had refused to train since.
And that, claims the report, is in protest at the manner in which club president Bruno de Carvalho is handling negotiations, which look set to drag on into a third week.
Meanwhile another Portuguese outlet, Jornal de Notícias, claims that the Hammers have now increased their bid to €35miliion - still some €5million short of Carvalho's minimum release fee of €40million.
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Winston Reid calf injury 'not serious' after West Ham defender stretchered off in warm-up
By Lyall Thomas & Andy Charles
Last Updated: 19/08/17 6:22pm
SSN
West Ham defender Winston Reid has picked up a calf injury but it is "nothing serious" according to manager Slaven Bilic The New Zealand international had to be stretchered off in the warm-up before Saturday's 3-2 Premier League defeat at Southampton. Bilic replaced him in the staring eleven with Angelo Ogbonna and said the timing of the knock was ironic after a pre-match discussion with his team. "It was like we were just talking; the players were doing the warm-up and it had been a long time since he had them all back and then (this happened)," Bilic said at full-time at St Mary's. "It's nothing serious but it was serious enough to rule him out of this game."
Hammers medical staff were swift to react when Reid went down - just days after he signed a new six-year deal - and they quickly summoned a stretcher. West Ham confirmed soon after that Ogbonna would start in his place and that Reid had suffered a calf injury.
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Slaven Bilic refused to criticise referee despite controversial calls in Souathampton defeat
Last Updated: 20/08/17 8:16pm
SSN
Slaven Bilic wouldn't be drawn on referee Lee Mason's performance after West Ham's controversial defeat at Southampton. The Saints ended their goal drought at St Mary's and increased 10-man West Ham's misery with a 3-2 Premier League victory secured by a stoppage-time penalty from Charlie Austin. Mason sent-off Marko Arnautovic in the first-half after the Austrian elbowed Jack Stephens and then awarded a penalty for Jose Fonte's foul on Steven Davis, from which Dusan Tadic scored. A double from Javier Hernandez, either side of half-time, drew the visitors level but Mason awarded a dubious late penalty for a foul by Pablo Zabaleta. "I don't want to talk about the penalty decisions, because there is no point talking about it," Bilic said. "I only want to say that I'm very proud of my team and they showed everything I said - commitment, quality, character, team spirit and we never gave up. "I don't want to talk about the red card, either. I am the manager and I want to talk about the game and the decisions are going to lead to someone else talking about it. Of course the player is disappointed, but I am going to talk about the quality of the game and not about the decisions. "It's very hard to play with 10 men, especially as we were already one goal down. We then conceded a second goal and it was difficult to come back. On paper it was very difficult to keep it to 2-0, but we showed character and commitment and that we are fit enough to do it for each other."
Despite the defeat, there were plenty of positives for Bilic to take, including the performance of Hernandez, who joined for £16million from Bayer Leverkusen earlier this month. The striker took both his goals nicely and put in a huge amount of work when asked to fill in on the left wing when the Hammers were defending with 10-men. "He is a goalscorer but if we're also talking about him we must also talk about the second half, when we asked him to play on the wing because we needed to use his legs," Bilic said. "We had to have two banks of four and sometimes defend with six when they attacked with their full-backs, so we have to praise him not only for his goals but also for his great attitude and great defensive work."
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West Ham close to completing William Carvalho deal from Sporting Lisbon
By Sky Sports News
Last Updated: 20/08/17 8:12pm
SSN
West Ham are close to signing William Carvalho, according to Sky sources. The Portugal international is understood to want a move to the Premier League and has a £40m release clause in his contract, but there is an awareness the deal needs to be done because other clubs have been alerted to his availability. Despite holding talks over the past two weeks, Sky Sports News understands Sporting will only sanction a deal to sell Carvalho if West Ham match the buy-out fee.
The 25-year-old, who helped Portugal win Euro 2016, is a product of the Sporting academy and has scored nine goals in 137 appearances since making his first-team debut in 2011. Sporting have recently signed midfielder Rodrigo Battaglia as a potential replacement for Carvalho. West Ham manager Slaven Bilic has made five major signings during the summer transfer window, with Pablo Zabaleta, Joe Hart, Marko Arnautovic, Javier Hernandez and Sead Haksabanovic arriving at the London Stadium. But the Hammers have lost both of their Premier League games so far this season, losing 4-0 at Manchester United and 3-2 at Southampton.
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Newcastle pondering sensational swoop for Geordie West Ham striker Andy Carroll
The £130,000-a-week West Ham striker has emerged as an option for his old club with an emotional, season-long loan on the cards
The Mirror
BYTOM HOPKINSON
22:30, 19 AUG 2017
Newcastle boss Rafa Benitez is considering a sensational swoop for Geordie boy Andy Carroll. The £130,000-a-week West Ham striker has emerged as an option for his old club with an emotional, season-long loan on the cards. And in a double raid on London, Benitez could take Arsenal midfielder Jack Wilshere, who will be allowed to leave Arsenal this summer, on loan as well. But it is a move for Carroll six years after he left the club which will really appeal to the Gallowgate faithful.
Carroll has been plagued by injury and the Hammers were willing to sell the 28-year-old to China in January. A move for the player did not materialise but if Newcastle firm up their interest then it is likely that West Ham will let him return to St James' Park. Meanwhile, West Ham are lining up a move for out-of-favour Barcelona midfielder Andre Gomes. Club representatives are due to meet the 24-year-old's agent this week to see if a deal is possible.
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West Ham reopen talks over £30m William Carvalho deal as Sporting Lisbon look for compromise over midfielder
Sporting have turned down a £22m bid from West Ham, which forced Slaven Bilic to look elsewhere
The Mirror
BYJOHN CROSS
12:59, 20 AUG 2017UPDATED15:28, 20 AUG 2017
West Ham have reopened talks with Sporting Lisbon over a £30m deal for William Carvalho. The Portuguese club have turned down a £22m bid from West Ham for the Sporting midfielder. West Ham pulled the plug and began to look elsewhere but it now appears Sporting are ready to find a compromise. Sporting are under financial pressures to sell this summer and in the past Liverpool, Manchester United and Arsenal have all looked at Carvalho but not signed him. That leaves West Ham in pole position this summer and if they can reach £30m with add-ons then they might find a deal. West Ham have backed Slaven Bilic heavily in the market with Joe Hart and Marko Arnautovic and are ready to dig deep again. Bilic wants a new midfielder and it looks a deal for Carvalho is back on.
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Declan Rice scouting report: West Ham youngster looks at home in Premier League on first start
Rice, 18, got the nod against Southampton, after an impressive cameo against Manchester United on the opening weekend
The Mirror
BYADRIAN KAJUMBA
17:13, 19 AUG 2017
Two games into the campaign and Declan Rice will already have to reset his aims for the season.
"My next target is to start in the Premier League, that's what I am aiming for," he said less than a month ago after featuring during pre-season for West Ham.
He can now tick that off after being handed a full debut against Southampton.
Rice, 18, got the nod, after an impressive cameo against Manchester United on the opening weekend, ahead of more experienced options Pedro Obiang and the versatile Edimilson Fernandes.
Rice captained West Ham's under-23s to promotion last season and, on a roller-coaster afternoon for the Hammers, his leadership and willingness to take responsibility, qualities they lacked at Old Trafford, stood out.
Almost instantly Rice, who played in a holding midfield role but his best position is centre-back, was bossing around his more experienced teammates, telling them where they should be, who to mark and who they should pass to.
And in the second half, as the Hammers chased an equaliser, it was the youngster showing maturity beyond his years and telling veteran Pablo Zabaleta not to rush a throw in with a 'calm down' gesture.
He was always checking over his shoulders, making sure he was aware of the dangers and passing options around him, and wasn't afraid to drop into high risk positions to demand the ball or be an extra body in defence.
Nothing showed off his nous than one first-half passage when West Ham scrambled back to try and stifle another Saints forward raid.
Rice spotted Nathan Redmond running into space, tried to alert one of his teammates to the forward's lurking threat.
But when nobody responded to his shouts Rice sprinted back into West Ham's back line and did the marking job himself, showing off his defensive instincts.
On the ball, Rice had little opportunity to show off what he could do especially after West Ham went down to 10 men in the first half.
This was a day for keeping it simple, doing the dirty work, trying to plug gaps in midfield and make himself available.
He did that to good effect and effortlessly during his 75 minutes on the pitch which ended with a deserved standing ovation from the travelling fans.
And he won't have to wait long to start a second game in the Premier League.
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http://vyperz.blogspot.com
WHUFC.com
Two goals from summer signing Chicharito was not enough for West Ham United to claim their first points of their season as the Irons fell to a 3-2 defeat at Southampton.
The Hammers appeared set for another tough afternoon on the road as goals from Marco Gabbiadini and Dusan Tadic put the Saints 2-0 up either side of a Marko Arnautovic red card.
Javier Hernandez was on hand to tuck in Michail Antonio's saved effort on the stroke of half-time before the No17 again proved his goalscoring prowess in the second period, knocking home after Fraser Forster saved a Diafra Sakho header.
However Southampton were awarded another penalty in the last minute of the match, from which Charlie Austin scored to give the hosts the win.
The Irons started the afternoon with difficulty before the contest even began as Winston Reid – who signed a new deal at the London Stadium on Friday– was ruled out in the warm-up due to a calf injury. Angelo Ogbonna came into the side in his place.
Despite West Ham United having the best early chances at St Mary's through Arnautovic and Michail Antonio, it was the Saints that took the lead on Eleven minutes as Gabbiadini slotted home after an exchange with Nathan Redmond.
Antonio looked tricky and moved the Hammers into dangerous territory but West Ham's afternoon was made much more difficult after a straight red card for Arnautovic.
The Serbian No7 was given his marching orders after a clash with defender Jack Stephens in the 33rd minute and Southampton doubled their lead just four minutes later from the penalty spot.
Ogbonna was adjudged to have brought down Steven Davis in the area and Dusan Tadic saw his spot-kick find the net via Joe Hart's feet.
Slaven Bilic's side were however given hope going into the second half after some brilliant work from Antonio saw the No30 get a shot on goal. The effort could only be parried by Fraser Forster, allowing Chicharito to sweep home his first goal for the Hammers.
Forster was again called into action early in the second period as Hernandez's teasing ball into Antonio could only be palmed out for a corner. Andre Ayew then saw a headed effort blocked by Stephens, although some calls suggested the ball had made contact with his upper arm.
Hernandez continued to prove a thorn in Southampton's side as the Mexican saw a tantalising effort on the half-volley swerve agonisingly wide of the home team's goal.
Gabbiadini came close to his second for the hosts after rattling the crossbar from 35 yards while Joe Hart was called into action twice in quick succession, making two difficult saves just after the hour mark.
Bilic made two changes half-way through the second period with Edimilson Fernandes and Diafra Sakho taking to the field in place of Antonio and Ayew, and the latter had a big hand in West Ham's equaliser.
Aaron Cresswell delivered a delicious ball into the box, from which Sakho saw his header palmed onto the cross-bar, and Chicharito was again on hand to finish the rebound and draw the Hammers level.
However Southampton were awarded another penalty in the closing moments of the game, after Pablo Zabaleta was ruled to have committed a foul, which substitute Charlie Austin tucked away.
Southampton: Forster; Cedric, Yoshida, Stephens, Bertrand; Davis (Long 80'), Romeu, Lemina (Ward-Prowse 64'), Redmond, Tadic; Gabbiadini (Austin 80')
Subs not used: McCarthy, Bednarek, McQueen, Boufal
Goals: Gabbiadini 11', Tadic (p) 38', Austin (p) 90'
West Ham: Hart; Zabaleta, Fonte, Ogbonna, Cresswell; Rice (Obiang 76'), Noble, Antonio (Sakho 67'), Ayew (Fernandes 67'), Arnautovic (s/o 33'), Hernandez
Subs not used: Adrian, Byram, Masuaku
Goals: Hernandez 45', 73'
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Bilic praises ten-man Hammers for Southampton spirit
WHUFC.com
Slaven Bilic focused on praising his players instead of criticising the match official after ten-man West Ham United came within a whisker of a courageous draw at Southampton.
The Hammers fell a goal down to Manolo Gabbiadini's early finish before losing Marko Arnautovic to a red card after the Austrian was adjudged to have elbowed Jack Stephens by referee Lee Mason.
Mr Mason then awarded a penalty for Jose Fonte's foul on Steven Davis before two Chicharito goals either side of half-time hauled the visitors level at St Mary's Stadium.
West Ham, who had seen their own penalty claims turned down when Stephens appeared to handle Andre Ayew's header, then conceded a second spot-kick in added time, when Pablo Zabaleta was penalised for a nudge on Maya Yoshida, enabling substitute Charlie Austin to break Claret and Blue hearts.
"We showed character and we showed quality and we showed that we could cope with ten men and we could score two goals and stop them from scoring," Bilic observed, when asked to sum up his team's performance.
"To be fair, we started off so good, we had two or three chances to take the lead and we didn't, so we were very disappointed to lose in the end."
One player who had every right to feel disappointed was Chicharito, who scored two typically predatory goals – his first for the Club following his summer move from Bayer Leverkusen – to drag his short-handed team level.
"He is a goalscorer but if we're also talking about him we must also talk about the second half, when we asked him to play on the wing because we needed to use his legs," he observed.
"We had to have two banks of four and sometimes defend with six when they attacked with their full-backs, so we have to praise him not only for his goals but also for his great attitude and great defensive work."
While he was proud of his players' performance, the manager simply would not be drawn on whether the major decisions had gone against his side on the south coast.
"I don't want to talk about the penalty decisions, because there is no point talking about it. I only want to say that I'm very proud of my team and they showed everything I said – commitment, quality, character, team spirit and we never gave up.
"I don't want to talk about the red card, either. I am the manager and I want to talk about the game and the decisions are going to lead to someone else talking about it. Of course the player is disappointed, but I am going to talk about the quality of the game and not about the decisions.
"It's very hard to play with ten men, especially as we were already one goal down. We then conceded a second goal and it was difficult to come back. On paper it was very difficult to keep it to 2-0, but we showed character and commitment and that we are fit enough to do it for each other.
"As soon as we equalised, we defended how you are meant to defend, very deep, and we waited for our chances and we got them. It was our gameplan at half-time and unfortunately we conceded a third one late on."
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Chicharito: West Ham can take positives from Southampton defeat
WHUFC.com
Chicharito believes West Ham United can take heart from a spirited fightback despite ultimately losing 3-2 at Southampton.
Javier Hernandez scored his first two Premier League goals for the Hammers on Saturday to bring Slaven Bilic's side back level after the Saints took a 2-0 lead.
If not for a debatable penalty decision in the 90th minute – which Charlie Austin tucked away – the Irons would have left St Mary's with a well-earned point.
But Chicharito believes West Ham United's true ability was shown with the comeback, and the spirit from this is the key factor for the team to remember rather than the heartbreak of the defeat.
"I will take confidence from my goals," Hernandez said: "They show the character of this team. We never give up and we tried to improve as much as we can following the last game [the loss to Manchester United].
"I'm happy that I scored two goals. You need to look on the bright side, at the positive things. Getting off the mark gives me motivation and it gives me confidence."
The Mexican admitted that he and his West Ham teammates were frustrated by a couple of refereeing decisions but feels the side can also take positives from their performance with ten men, after Marko Arnautovic was shown a red card in the first half.
It was after Arnautovic's dismissal that the Irons scored their two goals. Hernandez was on hand to tuck home after Michail Antonio's shot was saved, and was again in the right place to score following a Diafra Sakho header that was palmed onto the crossbar.
"When you're playing most of the game with ten men it's really frustrating," Hernandez conceded: "But we came back.
"It is very hard to play with just ten men. With eleven men it's hard so with ten it's very, very hard. We did it pretty well and we were drawing the game.
"Sometimes we make mistakes. It's very frustrating because we played a good game after the sending off. We need to move forward."
Moving forward means looking to West Ham United's Carabao Cup contest with Cheltenham Town on Wednesday evening.
Chicharito will be hoping to once again get on the scoresheet in the cup match this week as Slaven Bilic's side look to progress into the third round of the tournament.
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Antonio: We've just got to move forward
WHUFC.com
Michail Antonio believes West Ham United can take huge heart from their performance at Southampton.
The Hammers fell two goals down and lost Marko Arnautovic to a first-half red card, before roaring back through a brace of superb finishes from Chicharito, only for Charlie Austin's last-gasp penalty to break Claret and Blue hearts.
Antonio himself produced an all-action display on his return from four months out with a hamstring injury, reminding everyone of his power and ability to fashion chances out of nothing.
"It was devastating, really, we managed to get back to 2-2 from 2-0 down, but what a way to lose it!" said the No30, whose shot led to Chicharito's first goal on the stroke of half-time.
"I'm not going to make any comments about what actually happened, but the boys were devastated to lose it and we are just going to have to pick ourselves up and go again.
"There were loads of positives we can take from the game, especially from the second half, so we're going to take them away and get ready for Newcastle.
"There is lots of frustration. The boys are still in the dressing room now and all talking about it, saying they can't believe what's actually happened. I don't really know what you want me to say!"
Antonio was among those hugely impressed by the impact made by Chicharito, who reacted quickest on two occasions to finish clinically after Fraser Forster had saves from the winger and Diafra Sakho respectively.
"What a massive purchase we've got in Chicharito!" he exclaimed. "He is a fox in the box and he has shown the quality of player we have managed to bring in.
"We have just got to move forward. I'm getting back to my fitness and I'm starting to look sharp like I was at the beginning of last season, so hopefully I can keep progressing with that and start putting the ball in the back of the net."
The belief West Ham showed to draw level when the odds were stacked against them impressed Antonio, who insisted there is absolutely nothing wrong with the spirit in the camp, despite the fact they have now lost their opening two Premier League matches
"It shows there is nothing wrong in the camp, that we all believe in each other as we kept pushing forward and slinging balls in the box," he said.
"Basically, we had two balls which deflected and Chicha was in the right spot because he's a fox. Hopefully we can keep putting balls in the box and he can keep scoring goals."
Next up is a trip to newly-promoted Newcastle United and Antonio is sure the Hammers can get off the mark at St James' Park.
"We will be three games into the season and we need to get some points on the board, then we have Huddersfield at home and the season can start from there," he said.
He saved his final word for the Claret and Blue Army, who created a superb atmosphere at St Mary's Stadium with their non-stop singing and support for their team, even when circumstances were conspiring against them.
"They were the atmosphere," he observed. "They helped, they pushed us and managed to get us back into the game and the penalty just took it away from them in the final minutes of the game."
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5/7 shots on target: How Chicharito & Antonio impressed v Southampton
WHUFC.com
Despite suffering a late loss to Southampton on Saturday West Ham United can still take positives from the contest on the south coast.
Chicharito got his first two Premier League goals for the Hammers since signing this summer and the fixture also saw the return of Michail Antonio to action, who looked lively until his substitution midway through the second period.
Both players deserve praise for their efforts in the fixture on the south coast with each showing in their statistics just how strong their respective performances were.
Javier Hernandez's two goals in the contest both came after Fraser Forster had made initial saves, from Antonio and Diafra Sakho, and the Mexican's brace was netted with his only two shots on target in the fixture.
The No17 only attempted one more effort on goal in the entire game – a swerving half-volley which went narrowly wide – meaning Chicharito scored twice from three shots in this match.
Chicharito also did his duty defensively, making two defensive actions in the fixture in the form of an interception and a clearance.
Interestingly the striker didn't spent too long in possession, and his two attempts at take-ons did not succeed, but Hernandez's impact was still crucial for Slaven Bilic's side.
Hernandez also created two chances for his teammates, an amount that was equalled by Antonio.
The No30 missed the opening day contest with Manchester United but returned to the starting XI on Saturday, reminding the West Ham United faithful of his pace, power and ability.
Although Antonio couldn't get a goal he did test Forster on a number of occasions, seeing three of his four shots hit the target and put pressure on the Southampton shot-stopper.
The former Saints winger was a force in the air for West Ham United, winning six of his nine aerial duels during his 67 minutes on the field. Antonio also left Southampton defenders in his wake with his speed, succeeding with each of his four-attempted take-ons.
Antonio put serious pressure on the right-flank and gave Ryan Bertrand a seriously tough test for the Saints, and also exerted his pace up front as he and Hernandez fluidly switched throughout the contest.
Although the result ended in a defeat West Ham United supporters can take great comfort in how Chicharito and Antonio performed, and can now look to next week's matches against Cheltenham Town and Newcastle United with excitement at what the talented duo do next.
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SOUTHAMPTON 3-2 WEST HAM – MATCH REPORT
AUTHOR: BRIAN KNOX. PUBLISHED: 20 AUGUST 2017 AT 1:52PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Match Report by @WestHamAmerican
West Ham fell at St. Mary's today 3-2 in an up-and-down match that saw both moments of brilliance for the currently homeless Hammers, and moments of indiscipline, which cost West Ham the match. Slavin Bilic's side completely had the wheels come off late during last Sunday's opener at Old Trafford. (Swansea fell victim to the same fate today) And it looked as if the Manchester United hangover would continue today, as West Ham's opening half almost went as poorly as possible.
West Ham found themselves 2-0 down, and down to 10 men after 38 minutes due to Manolo Gabbiadini's opening goal and a Dusan Tadic penalty kick; which along with Marko Arnautovic's red card in the early minutes of play, showed the worst opening moments any Hammer supporter could hope for. This doesn't even include Winston Reid being stretchered off the pitch during opening warm-ups, suffering from some form of calf injury.
Michael Antonio and Havier Hernandez finally gave the vocal West Ham visiting fans something to cheer about in the 44th with Antonio's shot from the edge of the box earning a save from Forster, but Chicharito cleaning up the rebound. With a 2-1 deficit and only ten men, securing at least a point looked challenging, but momentum was on West Ham's side.
That momentum carried over into the 73rd minute when one of Aaron Cresswell's signature crosses found the head of Diafra Sakho, but his header met the crossbar. Once again Hernandez was present to strike the rebound into the roof of the net. With the match at 2-2, and Chicharito sporting a brace, Bilic looked to hang on and at least collect at least a point.
However, three minutes into the stoppage time, Pablo Zabelta, with Jose Fonte, clumsily brought down Maya Yoshida, as the defender chased James Ward-Prowse's cross, giving Southampton another penalty and Charlie Austin left no doubt as he scored the game winner.
As devastating as this result was, there were some bright spots. Obviously, Hernandez's scoring ability seems as strong as advertised. The return of Antonio was a success. Hopefully having Kouyate, Carroll, and Lanzini back in action will open up the West Ham attack to where Chicharito will have more opportunities.
During the match, the lack of discipline was stunning. While Zabaleta and Arnautovic are new to the club, Bilic will have to direct his starters to keep their heads about them. Last season West Ham was the most red carded side in the league. This league is unforgiving enough without playing almost an entire match with ten men.
Hopefully as the summer transfer window comes to a close, the club's position at the bottom of the table will not turn away any of the prominent targets we have bid on during the final two weeks. The board have made some great moves and once this team is at full strength, the wins will come. West Ham were the better team today, but with two spot kicks and a red card, it is nearly impossible to win anything as a visiting club. It will be interesting to see how Bilic selects for the midweek League Cup match. While this team is in desperate need of a victory, it can ill-afford to suffer any more prominent injuries. Stay tuned to The West Ham Way for all the information as the summer transfer window comes to a close.
Saints: Forster, Soares, Bertrand, Yoshida, Stephens, Davis, Tadic, Romeu, Lemina, Gabbiadini, Redmond.
Substitutes: McCarthy, Bednarek, McQueen, Ward-Prowse, Boufal, Long, Austin.
West Ham: Hart, Reid, Cresswell, Fonte, Zabaleta, Rice, Arnautovic, Noble, Antonio, Ayew, Chicharito.
Substitutes:Adrian, Byram, Masuaku, Ogbonna, Obiang, Fernandes, Sakho
Referee: Lee Mason
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REF WATCH: LEE MASON – SOUTHAMPTON VS WEST HAM
AUTHOR: SAMTWHWREF. PUBLISHED: 19 AUGUST 2017 AT 8:59PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by SamRoyden
After receiving the biggest defeat on the opening day of the Premier League in 11 years, West Ham needed to kick start the season at Southampton who haven't scored in 9 fixtures at St Mary's. Slaven Bilić gave youngster Declan Rice his first Premier League start in a changed team which saw Michail Antonio break into the starting 11 after returning from a hamstring injury.
The referee appointed for his gameweek 2 fixture was Lee Mason. Mason hasn't bathed himself in glory over the last couple of seasons with wayward and controversial decision making. This fixture was Mason's first Premier League fixture of the season after being appointment Cardiff vs Sheffield United in the Championship last week.
During the first half, Lee Mason had a number of high profile decisions that needed to be made which was meant an incident packed first 45 minutes. In the first 20 minutes, I thought that Mason was in control but the game very quickly got away from him. The first big decision Mason had to make was when Dušan Tadić clattered into Javier Hernandez on the half way line making no attempt to play the ball. When looking at the challenge, it's reckless. Tadić completely misjudged his challenge and in my opinion was rightly cautioned. There were calls for a red card and if the Southampton man caught Hernandez with either foot or leg, I would have expected Mason to show Tadić a red card.
Ultimately, the deciding factor was whether the players safety was at risk or not and it's something I think about during every decision. As I mentioned above, the challenge was reckless, Tadić used his body and in the Laws of The Game, a challenge of this reckless sort is warranted with a caution. If Tadić caught the Mexican, leading with his foot or leg, this would have been excessive force and this would warrant a red card.
Lee Mason had a very interesting 30 seconds midway through the first half after missing two fouls where both players subsequently should have taken disciplinary action. Marko Arnautović was on the receiving end of an elbow to the newly signed midfielder Mario Lemina after both players went up to challenge for the ball. In my opinion, this was a foul as Lemina caught Arnautović but it was unintentional and was for leverage to jump instead of trying to endanger. Mason's decision making on this incident bothered me for two reasons: Firstly, was that it was a foul and Lemina should have been cautioned and secondly Arnautović sustained a head injury and the game should have been stopped. Lee Mason failed to do either of these which is poor decision making by the referee.
While Arnautović was on the floor injured, Mark Noble stupidly went into a challenge two footed with Mario Lemina who committed to a sliding challenge. Mark Noble caught the Southampton midfielder high on the shin and Lee Mason completely missed this challenge and eventually blew for Arnautović to receive treatment. In my opinion, Mark Noble should have been sent off as it was a very poor challenge as he used excessive force. Noble was very lucky to be on the field and this was another decision Lee Mason failed to see.
Marko Arnautović always had a bad temperament which we saw in his Stoke days on a couple of occasions and his actions during the game was completely stupid and unnecessary. After the ball had gone by Jack Stephens, Arnautović struck the Southampton defender with his elbow in the neck region. Lee Mason and his assistant referee got this decision spot on and Arnautović should have no complaints. This is a stupid challenge by Arnautović and therefore he will miss the next three games for violent conduct
The misery continued for West Ham as José Fonte conceded a penalty for blatantly pulling back Stephen Davis. This was a stone wall penalty and Mason was on hand to award it. Fonte wasn't cautioned for his attempt to stop Davis from controlling the ball inside the area but should have been given a caution for this but Mason chose not too. Even though Fonte made no genuine attempt to play the ball, it wasn't an obvious goalscoring opportunity so it wouldn't have been a red card offence.
The second half for Lee Mason was a lot quieter than the first but he continued to have game-changing decisions to make. The first decision Mason had to make was whether Jack Stephens intentionally handled the ball or not after Ayew's header struck the defenders arm. There is no doubt that Andre Ayew's header hit Stephens on the arm; From my first view it appeared that his arm was in a natural position but I've seen these given. I do have to question Lee Mason's positioning for the corner. Mason was positioned on the edge of the D on the penalty area. Mason should have been nearer to the corner of the 18 yards box so his vision could not be impaired and to allow your assistant referee to look along his line of sight. Upon replays, it was clear that Mason's view was obstructed and he couldn't have given a decision as he couldn't see it. Positioning is taught very early in a refereeing career, especially for set pieces which allow your assistant referee to look across the line and for the referee to look into the crowd of players to give you, as the referee, the best opportunity to give a decision. It's strange that Mason took this position and he was guilty of taking other strange positioning throughout the game.
I've said before that goalkeepers are over protected by officials but I thought Mason got the decision to disallow the Southampton goal correct. As the ball ricocheted in the air, West Ham goalkeeper Joe Hart was poised to jump and collect/challenge for the ball but as Hart was about to jump, Nathan Redmond barged into the England number one and the goal was correctly disallowed.
I thought that Lee Mason had an average performance, with a handful of mistakes and a terrible 30 seconds in the first half but overall his performance was overshadowed by a very soft 91st minute penalty decision for Southampton's second penalty of the game. Southampton defender Maya Yoshida went down under minimal pressure by West Ham's Pablo Zabaleta whilst trying to latch on to a Ward-Prowse cross. Lee Mason pointed straight to the spot with West Ham players bewildered with his decision and cautioning Zabaleta in the process. Firstly, it was clear that Mason's position was poor once again as he took up a position which didn't give him a side on view of the challenge. Secondly, admittedly there was pressure from Zabaleta but there wasn't enough to give a foul in my opinion. If this incident occurred anywhere else on the pitch, it would not be classed as a foul. Thirdly, and more frustrating from a fans perspective, Zabaleta gave Lee Mason a decision to make in the final seconds of normal time. He should be experienced enough not to do that which Bilić will be furious about.
West Ham now sit rock bottom of the Premier League after two games. For the last 30 minutes of the game, I thought we looked comfortable and gunning for a draw with two great goals from Javier Hernandez. Since his sending off, Marko Arnautović has apologised on Instagram but his stupidity means he will be absent for three games against Cheltenham, Newcastle and the first home game of the season against Huddersfield. This kind of attitude and lack of self control cannot be tolerated and it put us in a difficult position for the rest of the game. Our defence is looking very suspect already after conceding 7 goals in two games. The amount of space that we gave Southampton in the middle of the park was a concern. There was no urgency in the middle of the park to put pressure on Southampton and time after time they split our defence with balls through midfield and defence just like Manolo Gabbiadini.
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A REFLECTION ON SOUTHAMPTON
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 20 AUGUST 2017 AT 10:04PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Written by Leon Shearing @leonshearing
Firstly I'd like to thank ex for the opportunity to write this article. To even be considered is an honour in itself. Cheers ex.
Wow, where do I start. A rollercoaster of a day but then we are all used to that following our beloved hammers.
It starts early 5:45 (no need for an alarm) as I awake eagerly anticipating another West Ham away day. We hit the road at 8:30 to meet with the rest of the lads I attend games with. I don't know why but I still get overly excited about going to watch West Ham. It's not all about the football but about the build up to the game, the company you keep, the other fans you meet and discuss your opinions with, learn their views and the new friends you make along your way. There really are some great characters you come across sporting the famous claret and blue. Southampton is one away day that I look forward to more than most. We take over yates' each time we are down the south coast. The place gradually fills by the minute with the claret and blue army turning up in their droves to support their idols and the atmosphere is building. By around midday the beer is flowing the place is buzzing and jam packed. People laughing, joking and generally having a good time. Choruses of bubbles ring out around the boozer and everywhere you look there is a fellow hammer singing their heart out. There are blokes wearing Mexican football shirts, sombreros and taches in honour of our little pea who I'm sure will become a cult hero. After a few more pints we take the short down the hill to St Mary's stadium which is a ground I quite like. It holds good memories for me as it is the place where I took my daughter for her first away game last season, a 1-3 win which I'm certain you all remember, shame that result couldn't be repeated yesterday.
On learning the starting 11 I had mixed views with Slav's selections. Fonte coming in for Ogbonna, I don't really rate Fonte that highly. He was brought into the club in January as cover for Ogbonna as he had been playing with an injury for a period of time. I think it's fair to say that Fonte hasn't lived up to the expectations of our loyal fans. My preferred centre back pairing in a flat 4 is Reid and Ogbonna. For me Ginge is above Fonte in the pecking order as for me he is a no nonsense centre half that gets the job done, is reliable and gives his all for the shirt.
Reid being stretchered off in the warm up was a huge blow for us. He is the best centre back at the club in my opinion and I for one hope that the injury isn't too serious and he is back fit sooner rather than later.
Cresswell coming in for Masuaku was a no brainer. I rate both our left backs but Arthur didn't exactly cover himself in glory at Old Trafford a week ago. I'm sure you have all seen the footage of his shenanigans in the lead up to Lukaku's second goal and that doesn't sit well with me or most if not all of you I'm sure.
Declan Rice coming in for Obiang was harsh in my opinion. Although Obiang wasn't great last week he was one of our stand out performers last term and he can feel aggrieved to have been left out. Having said that I do feel that Rice has earned his chance and I'm all for giving the youth their shot, after all we are the academy of football.
This maybe controversial but lots were singing his praises after his substitute performance against Man Utd last week, but coming in when you are 2-0 down and the game effectively lost wasn't too difficult. Man Utd didn't need to press the game so there was lots of time and space for Declan to do his thing. I'm not in anyway trying to say he didn't look impressive, I'm just trying to look at the bigger picture. From what I have heard and seen of the young man in the media and on the pitch I think he has a very bright future ahead of him and we may have a future star on our hands.
To have Antonio back is a great boost for the club and the fans. He us a favourite in the terraces and rightly so. He offers something that no one else at the club does and I don't mean his crazy goal celebrations. He is quick and ridiculously strong on the ball. His unpredictability is a great asset. I love how he is always positive and direct. I feel pace is something that we lack massively. The modern game is all about pace and a lot of goals are scored from fast counter attacking football especially in the premier league. I feel that we move the ball too slowly the vast majority of the time which when breaking gives the opposition time to get numbers back behind the ball. This is why I believe Antonio is vital to our football club.
After watching yesterday's game and the defeat at Old Trafford last week we seem to be lacking on the fitness front, this I believe has been an issue for us for some time, stretching back to last season. The match sharpness will come I get that. There is fit and then there is match fit but we seem to be a couple of yards of the pace. There was numerous times yesterday that we wasn't even close to winning the "second ball" which obviously invites pressure. It's difficult to do this with 10 men I understand that but to lose out on it so many occasions tells me it is an issue. I hope this is something that Slav and his staff have picked up on and it will he addressed.
I'm hearing and reading a lot of "Slav has got "x" amount of games to sort it out or he has to go"
The board gave decided that he is the man for the job so for me this talk is crazy and frankly a little over the top for this early in the season. I mean what would be the point of working with the manager over the close season on a shortlist of players that he wants at the club, backing him with the funds to get the personnel in and then not giving him time to work with the new recruits. We have moved deadwood on and got in some very good players. With a little under 2 weeks remaining in this window I don't think and hope that our business is concluded. The squad is beginning to gain depth something if which I don't believe we have had for a very long time.
Give Antonio and some of the fringe players a crack in mid week for the league cup tie and with Lanzini, Kouyate and Carroll hopefully in contention for Newcastle in the league next weekend things can only get better.
We move on together COYI
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Carvalho injured - or refusing to train?
KUMB.com
Filed: Friday, 18th August 2017
By: Staff Writer
Hammers target William Carvalho has failed to report for training with his current club this week - boosting rumours that he may yet be on his way to West Ham.
The defensive midfielder was the subject of a bid in the region of €30million by West Ham last week, since when the two clubs have been haggling over a the price (with an agreement yet to be reached).
However reports from Lisbon today suggest that Carvalho may be deliberately missing training in an attempt to push through a move to the Premier League.
Although he was unavailable for the Champions League game against Steaua Bucharest in midweek due to suspension and a purported shoulder problem, local news outlet Correio da Manhã claimed today that the 25-year-old had refused to train since.
And that, claims the report, is in protest at the manner in which club president Bruno de Carvalho is handling negotiations, which look set to drag on into a third week.
Meanwhile another Portuguese outlet, Jornal de Notícias, claims that the Hammers have now increased their bid to €35miliion - still some €5million short of Carvalho's minimum release fee of €40million.
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Winston Reid calf injury 'not serious' after West Ham defender stretchered off in warm-up
By Lyall Thomas & Andy Charles
Last Updated: 19/08/17 6:22pm
SSN
West Ham defender Winston Reid has picked up a calf injury but it is "nothing serious" according to manager Slaven Bilic The New Zealand international had to be stretchered off in the warm-up before Saturday's 3-2 Premier League defeat at Southampton. Bilic replaced him in the staring eleven with Angelo Ogbonna and said the timing of the knock was ironic after a pre-match discussion with his team. "It was like we were just talking; the players were doing the warm-up and it had been a long time since he had them all back and then (this happened)," Bilic said at full-time at St Mary's. "It's nothing serious but it was serious enough to rule him out of this game."
Hammers medical staff were swift to react when Reid went down - just days after he signed a new six-year deal - and they quickly summoned a stretcher. West Ham confirmed soon after that Ogbonna would start in his place and that Reid had suffered a calf injury.
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Slaven Bilic refused to criticise referee despite controversial calls in Souathampton defeat
Last Updated: 20/08/17 8:16pm
SSN
Slaven Bilic wouldn't be drawn on referee Lee Mason's performance after West Ham's controversial defeat at Southampton. The Saints ended their goal drought at St Mary's and increased 10-man West Ham's misery with a 3-2 Premier League victory secured by a stoppage-time penalty from Charlie Austin. Mason sent-off Marko Arnautovic in the first-half after the Austrian elbowed Jack Stephens and then awarded a penalty for Jose Fonte's foul on Steven Davis, from which Dusan Tadic scored. A double from Javier Hernandez, either side of half-time, drew the visitors level but Mason awarded a dubious late penalty for a foul by Pablo Zabaleta. "I don't want to talk about the penalty decisions, because there is no point talking about it," Bilic said. "I only want to say that I'm very proud of my team and they showed everything I said - commitment, quality, character, team spirit and we never gave up. "I don't want to talk about the red card, either. I am the manager and I want to talk about the game and the decisions are going to lead to someone else talking about it. Of course the player is disappointed, but I am going to talk about the quality of the game and not about the decisions. "It's very hard to play with 10 men, especially as we were already one goal down. We then conceded a second goal and it was difficult to come back. On paper it was very difficult to keep it to 2-0, but we showed character and commitment and that we are fit enough to do it for each other."
Despite the defeat, there were plenty of positives for Bilic to take, including the performance of Hernandez, who joined for £16million from Bayer Leverkusen earlier this month. The striker took both his goals nicely and put in a huge amount of work when asked to fill in on the left wing when the Hammers were defending with 10-men. "He is a goalscorer but if we're also talking about him we must also talk about the second half, when we asked him to play on the wing because we needed to use his legs," Bilic said. "We had to have two banks of four and sometimes defend with six when they attacked with their full-backs, so we have to praise him not only for his goals but also for his great attitude and great defensive work."
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West Ham close to completing William Carvalho deal from Sporting Lisbon
By Sky Sports News
Last Updated: 20/08/17 8:12pm
SSN
West Ham are close to signing William Carvalho, according to Sky sources. The Portugal international is understood to want a move to the Premier League and has a £40m release clause in his contract, but there is an awareness the deal needs to be done because other clubs have been alerted to his availability. Despite holding talks over the past two weeks, Sky Sports News understands Sporting will only sanction a deal to sell Carvalho if West Ham match the buy-out fee.
The 25-year-old, who helped Portugal win Euro 2016, is a product of the Sporting academy and has scored nine goals in 137 appearances since making his first-team debut in 2011. Sporting have recently signed midfielder Rodrigo Battaglia as a potential replacement for Carvalho. West Ham manager Slaven Bilic has made five major signings during the summer transfer window, with Pablo Zabaleta, Joe Hart, Marko Arnautovic, Javier Hernandez and Sead Haksabanovic arriving at the London Stadium. But the Hammers have lost both of their Premier League games so far this season, losing 4-0 at Manchester United and 3-2 at Southampton.
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Newcastle pondering sensational swoop for Geordie West Ham striker Andy Carroll
The £130,000-a-week West Ham striker has emerged as an option for his old club with an emotional, season-long loan on the cards
The Mirror
BYTOM HOPKINSON
22:30, 19 AUG 2017
Newcastle boss Rafa Benitez is considering a sensational swoop for Geordie boy Andy Carroll. The £130,000-a-week West Ham striker has emerged as an option for his old club with an emotional, season-long loan on the cards. And in a double raid on London, Benitez could take Arsenal midfielder Jack Wilshere, who will be allowed to leave Arsenal this summer, on loan as well. But it is a move for Carroll six years after he left the club which will really appeal to the Gallowgate faithful.
Carroll has been plagued by injury and the Hammers were willing to sell the 28-year-old to China in January. A move for the player did not materialise but if Newcastle firm up their interest then it is likely that West Ham will let him return to St James' Park. Meanwhile, West Ham are lining up a move for out-of-favour Barcelona midfielder Andre Gomes. Club representatives are due to meet the 24-year-old's agent this week to see if a deal is possible.
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West Ham reopen talks over £30m William Carvalho deal as Sporting Lisbon look for compromise over midfielder
Sporting have turned down a £22m bid from West Ham, which forced Slaven Bilic to look elsewhere
The Mirror
BYJOHN CROSS
12:59, 20 AUG 2017UPDATED15:28, 20 AUG 2017
West Ham have reopened talks with Sporting Lisbon over a £30m deal for William Carvalho. The Portuguese club have turned down a £22m bid from West Ham for the Sporting midfielder. West Ham pulled the plug and began to look elsewhere but it now appears Sporting are ready to find a compromise. Sporting are under financial pressures to sell this summer and in the past Liverpool, Manchester United and Arsenal have all looked at Carvalho but not signed him. That leaves West Ham in pole position this summer and if they can reach £30m with add-ons then they might find a deal. West Ham have backed Slaven Bilic heavily in the market with Joe Hart and Marko Arnautovic and are ready to dig deep again. Bilic wants a new midfielder and it looks a deal for Carvalho is back on.
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Declan Rice scouting report: West Ham youngster looks at home in Premier League on first start
Rice, 18, got the nod against Southampton, after an impressive cameo against Manchester United on the opening weekend
The Mirror
BYADRIAN KAJUMBA
17:13, 19 AUG 2017
Two games into the campaign and Declan Rice will already have to reset his aims for the season.
"My next target is to start in the Premier League, that's what I am aiming for," he said less than a month ago after featuring during pre-season for West Ham.
He can now tick that off after being handed a full debut against Southampton.
Rice, 18, got the nod, after an impressive cameo against Manchester United on the opening weekend, ahead of more experienced options Pedro Obiang and the versatile Edimilson Fernandes.
Rice captained West Ham's under-23s to promotion last season and, on a roller-coaster afternoon for the Hammers, his leadership and willingness to take responsibility, qualities they lacked at Old Trafford, stood out.
Almost instantly Rice, who played in a holding midfield role but his best position is centre-back, was bossing around his more experienced teammates, telling them where they should be, who to mark and who they should pass to.
And in the second half, as the Hammers chased an equaliser, it was the youngster showing maturity beyond his years and telling veteran Pablo Zabaleta not to rush a throw in with a 'calm down' gesture.
He was always checking over his shoulders, making sure he was aware of the dangers and passing options around him, and wasn't afraid to drop into high risk positions to demand the ball or be an extra body in defence.
Nothing showed off his nous than one first-half passage when West Ham scrambled back to try and stifle another Saints forward raid.
Rice spotted Nathan Redmond running into space, tried to alert one of his teammates to the forward's lurking threat.
But when nobody responded to his shouts Rice sprinted back into West Ham's back line and did the marking job himself, showing off his defensive instincts.
On the ball, Rice had little opportunity to show off what he could do especially after West Ham went down to 10 men in the first half.
This was a day for keeping it simple, doing the dirty work, trying to plug gaps in midfield and make himself available.
He did that to good effect and effortlessly during his 75 minutes on the pitch which ended with a deserved standing ovation from the travelling fans.
And he won't have to wait long to start a second game in the Premier League.
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http://vyperz.blogspot.com
Saturday, August 19
Daily WHUFC News - 19th August 2017
Southampton v West Ham: All you need to know
WHUFC.com
West Ham's second test in the Premier League this season comes away at
Southampton. The Saints drew their opening match against Swansea and the
Hammers head to St Mary's having beaten the south coast side 3-1 on their
last trip down the M3.
Read on for all you need to know ahead of Saturday's fixture including team
news, players to watch and much more...
Where and when?
Southampton v West Ham United will be played at St Mary's Stadium on
Saturday 19 August 2017 at 3pm BST.
The stadium address is: Britannia Road, Southampton SO14 5FP
How to follow
You can follow the game live via our Matchday Blog on whufc.com, with
updates also available on Twitter throughout the afternoon. You can also
follow the match in different ways on our official Instagram, Facebook and
Snapchat channels!
Due to being a Saturday 3pm kick-off the match is not available for viewing
in the UK. For worldwide broadcast schedules, click here.
Audio coverage will be provided by TalkSPORT on TalkSPORT2.
Team news
Michail Antonio is expected to return to the first team this weekend, having
come through an U23s contest last Friday unscathed.
Andy Carroll and Cheikhou Kouyate are still out but the duo could be back in
time to feature against Newcastle in a week's time.
Sead Haksabanovic could also be involved after impressing on his debut with
the U21s this week.
Match officials
Referee: Lee Mason
Assistant Referees: Constantine Hatzidakis and Matthew Wilkes
Fourth Official: Neil Swarbrick
Meet the opposition
Southampton started the campaign with a new manager in Mauricio Pellegrino
and earned a 0-0 draw at St Mary's against Swansea City.
The south coast team finished eighth in the Premier League last season, one
point ahead of the Hammers, having returned to the top flight the same year
as West Ham - for the 2012-2013 campaign.
The Saints announced this week that Chinese businessman Jisheng Gao had
purchased an 80% stake in the club, so exciting times are ahead for
Southampton.
Player to watch
Having returned to action with the U23s on Friday Michail Antonio could make
his first Premier League appearance of the season for the Hammers on
Saturday.
Antonio - last season's top scorer - will be a valuable option for Slaven
Bilic to call on as West Ham look to secure a first win of the season at
Antonio's former side.
The versatile attacker brings pace, power and creativity to the West Ham
front-line and will undoubtedly prove a tricky test for Southampton's
defence if he plays.
Head to head
West Ham's last match with Southampton, in February of this year, was also
away from home but the Irons still managed to secure an impressive 3-1 win.
Despite going a goal behind Andy Carroll, Pedro Obiang and Mark Noble all
found the net to give Bilic's team a deserved victory at St Mary's Stadium.
The two clubs have met ten times since returning to the Premier League -
West Ham have won four of those and three have been draws.
Last five meetings
Southampton 1-3 West Ham, Premier League, 4 February 2017
West Ham 0-3 Southampton, Premier League, 25 September 2016
Southampton 1-0 West Ham, Premier League, 6 February 2016
West Ham 2-1 Southampton, Premier League, 28 December 2015
Southampton 0-0 West Ham, Premier League, 11 February 2015
How to get there
By car: From the M25, leave at Junction 12 and merge onto M3 towards
Basingstoke/Southampton. On the M3 exit at Junction 14 towards
A33/Southampton.
Continue onto A27 and then follow signs for the A33. Keep left on the way to
St Andrews Road and turn right onto Britannia Rd/B3038.
Public transport: Shuttle bus services run from Southampton Central railway
station to the stadium, in addition to the regular bus schedule, for a fee
of £2 for a return journey on matchdays. These are also available from the
Town Quay Ferry Terminal.
Those services will begin two hours before the match starts. The service
will be in operation after the match to take passengers back to the railway
station or the ferry terminal.
The service is not a numbered bus service and will simply say 'Stadium
Shuttle' on inbound journeys and 'Rail/Ferry Shuttle' on outbound journeys.
Ticket information
All 3,200 allocated tickets have sold out.
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SLAVEN BILIC'S SOUTHAMPTON PRESS CONFERENCE
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 17 AUGUST 2017 AT 3:35PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Can we talk about injuries, is Mikael Antonio fit?
Yes he is ready, he took part in a game last week which was part of the plan
and he looks fit and ready to play, he has been training for two and a half
weeks now. He looks good and ready.
Kouyate and Andy Carroll started training yesterday as well, they have done
a couple of training sessions. We have to see with them because Andy has
had a long layout and Kouyate has had a few weeks off as it happened in the
first training session in Austria. Lanzini is training separately and is
joining in with the full squad on Monday. We should have a full squad back
for the Newcastle game.
Some harsh analysis after Manchester United?
You can't say it is Man United and make excuses we should have done better,
especially when it comes to the last couple of minutes. We didn't give up
individually but we know that it is not very smart. It is not the same if
you lose 2-0 to losing 4-0. I wanted to find the balance between
criticising and talking about what went wrong but we don't want to lose
confidence because of one defeat. We have looked good in training today.
We want to approach the game against Southampton in a positive mood, knowing
what we have to do to get something positive out of the game. Southampton
are consistent, not with managers, but with the way they are playing.
What is the latest on William Carvalho?
I don't know, we will see what happens with ins and outs it has become very
busy at other clubs. I have left it with the board and the chairman. I
concentrate purely on the matches.
Karen Brady said clubs are in favour of the transfer window closing early,
are you?
Yes I would like that to happen we agree with them. It has to be across the
leagues otherwise there is no point. Ironically it would put the clubs in a
worse situation because you will still lose players if clubs from abroad do
not have the same system. It would only protect us that no other premier
league clubs could take our players but it wouldn't stop them from abroad.
For me it is a great idea, some teams are losing 30% of their teams and this
makes it hard. So it would be much better if the window stopped before the
first game of the season and across Europe.
You mentioned Coutinho, similar with Costa, do you have sympathy with these
managers because you had the same thing with Payet?
Of course I do, the new window would stop this when the season started. It
makes it hard to concentrate on games because the window is still open.
Sometimes you are on the other side of the story but definitely it doesn't
help the managers?
Do players have too much power?
What is important and gives you strength as a manager and a club is that you
are on the same line as the chairman. This is very important because then
you as a collective group are more powerful, you have to be on the same
line?
Has the balance gone too far to the players?
You know better than me but yes the power is too much on the power of the
players and agents and it is hard for the managers but sometimes you are on
the other end of it. I never advise a player to stop training to force a
move that is low and it shouldn't be like that.
One positive was Declan Rice from the Manchester United game?
It is nice to have those situations, we never try to force it. He is a boy,
who is very mature for his age, who is very good for his age and is very
mature. He has got the quality and he impressed everybody-the West Ham
family. In preseason he played every game and he wasn't in the plans in the
beginning but he forced them. It's too early for the kid but he is
improving and he is doing really well. Definitely the reason, yes we had
injuries, but he came on against Man United because I was confident he could
do it instantly. He came on against Burnley, last five minutes, it was an
important game and it was 2-1 to us and we put him in because he was the
best option. I don't want to praise him too much, despite his family are
down to earth-he will stay focused.
Last season West Ham moved into a new stadium on the football side, Spurs
move into a new one this weekend what advice would you give them?
We found it different and it was only us. It happened to a few clubs who
have moved stadiums. There is no magic formula, last year Spurs found it
hard at Wembley. It wasn't always against top clubs. I am not too bothered
to be fair. They will need time to adjust.
Can I ask you about Joe Hart what impact has he had on the dressing room?
He has had a big impact, he is England's number 1 and he is very vocal on
the pitch and on the training ground. He organises the defence and he
shouts and we are very happy with him so far. We have two really good
goalkeepers.
Andy Carroll is back in training, is there anything he is doing different to
avoid the constant injuries?
We are trying as a club and him personally. It would be wrong to think of
the World Cup. Hopefully in 10 games we can build on that but unfortunately
with a long lay out you can't plan that long term. Our aim is to find a
solution that will make him long term fit. For that you need him to start
playing games. We don't want to rush him into a game against Southampton,
even though he could have a big impact from the sub bench. We don't want to
risk getting new injuries and we have to give him a short preseason before
he enters the pitch. Only that way could he try and stay fit and then he
can think about England.
If Courtinho does leave for Barcelona are you worried that Liverpool will
come for Lanzini?
Max emails me these stories straight away to shock me a bit. We spoke about
this before Manchester United, I speak to Manu every day, he is happy. He
feels at home, he feels liked. You can see it, you don't have to talk to
him, and you can see by how he is smiling and is happy. He broke into the
Argentina national team. So he knows if he plays for West Ham he has a
chance of getting a better contract with West Ham and playing for Argentina.
Is there a price tag? £100m?
No I am sure he is going to stay with us. He knows he is wanted, the
chairman and the board, he was on loan, and we took an option before we had
to. He was voted the players player of the year, makes you feel wanted. He
likes it here.
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West Ham boss Slaven Bilic sympathises with Southampton over Virgil van Dijk
By James Dale
Last Updated: 17/08/17 11:15pm
SSN
Slaven Bilic has sympathy for Southampton manager Mauricio Pellegrino over
want-away defender Virgil van Dijk. West Ham face Saints at St Mary's this
weekend with Pellegrino unable to call upon centre-back Van Dijk - who has
submitted a transfer request. Southampton maintain Van Dijk will not be
sold, but the ongoing transfer saga is all too familiar for Bilic after he
saw Dimitri Payet eventually get his way and leave for Marseille following a
drawn out impasse with West Ham. "I know that the power is too much on the
side of the players and their agents," said Bilic. "The power is massive.
And you can't say that we have to fight it. We have to live with it and we
have to try to find the best possible solution for the club. "That is the
best possible situation for the manager as well. "That's why I say the
football game is very simple but the manager's job is very complicated.
Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, on the pitch and off the pitch. "Of
course I have a lot of sympathy. It's hard for them, and sometimes you are
on the other side of the story. "Sometimes you are in the position that you
are getting the player, but it definitely doesn't help. It doesn't help the
managers."
West Ham vice-chairman Karren Brady revealed on Sky Sports' The Debate
earlier this week that 17 Premier League clubs are in favour of shutting the
transfer window before the season starts. Bilic - who insists Manuel
Lanzini will be staying at the club this summer - backed the sentiments from
his board, but believes the change must take place beyond the English top
flight. "Yes. It is mutual from me and the club," said Bilic. "I would like
that to happen, it would help everybody. "For me it is has to be across the
leagues. Otherwise there is no point. Ironically it would put the clubs in a
worse situation that you would still lose players if clubs abroad want them
and you can't replace them. It would only protect us in that no other
Premier League clubs can take your players. "The [Philippe] Coutinho
situation, it would not stop Liverpool losing him, but would stop them
finding a replacement. It's a great idea, first one I'm definitely like
'yes'.
"Some teams are losing like 30 per cent of their teams."
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The West Ham Way is now the Southampton Way, and the Hammers have to make it
work
JOHN DILLON
ES Sport
The West Ham Way? Remember that? It's changed so much. But one laughable
aspect of the way the Hammers do things remains steadfastly in place.
That's their weak-minded capability to roll over and capitulate against the
big teams (and some smaller ones) in a feeble style un-matched with such
regularity anywhere else in the Premier League. Already, the 4-0 humiliation
they suffered at Manchester United last Sunday has made this weekend's trip
to Southampton more fraught than it needs to have been. There will be added
scrutiny of the result and performance on the South Coast because of the way
in which Slaven Bilic's side surrendered at Old Trafford.
For that immediate reason, it is welcome news that the robust pair of
Michail Antonio and Cheikhou Kouyate may be available for the game after
recovering from injury. The team needs to toughen up. Quickly. In fact, it
makes this a good time to set aside all those fallacies about the Hammers'
unquenchable penchant for elegant, lovely football and about their
much-marketed Academy, too. It all happened decades ago. Those ideas are
actually practised with more conviction these days by Saturday's opponents,
who have a well-defined philosophy which produces young players and attempts
to create a technical style of play whoever is manager. Funnily enough,
they call it The Southampton Way. And it put them in eighth place in the
final table last season.
West Ham, meanwhile, have chosen a different path in their awkward new home
at the London Stadium. For example, it's been made clear by the board that
there will be little room for young players to break into the side regularly
in future. The demands of the modern Premier League mean they have to buy in
ready-made seasoning and experience, they say – with much justification, in
fact, given that West Ham see themselves as a bigger club than the Saints.
It certainly made good sense when Bilic signed the physically powerful pair
of Marko Arnautovic and Pablo Zabaleta during the summer It was recognition
that the team was seriously lacking strength as well as pace last season.
The pursuit of Sporting Lisbon's defensive midfielder William Carvalho -
once described as a new Patrick Vieira - underlines this idea, even if it
should temper the excitement which greeted the appearance of 18-year-old
Declan Rice amid the carnage in midfield in Manchester last Sunday. "The
West Ham Way? Funnily enough, they call it The Southampton Way. And it put
them in eighth place in the final table last season."
But having chosen this path – and added to the disgruntlement of many
supporters who despair at the changes in the nature of the club - they now
have to make it work. That's the trade-off required for the abandonment of
much-cherished Upton Park. So far, there is little sign of it.
To get things straight, the so-called West Ham Way was represented by the
tough, physical and honest attitudes of Billy Bonds as much as it was by the
deft magic of Sir Trevor Brooking and Alan Devonshire. It is Bonzo who is
the all-time greatest hero of the fans – even more so than Bobby Moore –
which is why the club, with all its PR troubles, should heed the campaign to
get a stand named after him in Stratford. True enough, all of those players
had more bad times than good. That's the West Ham way, too. They were often
seen as a soft touch. Especially Up North. So even now, it will be welcome
progress if Bilic makes his side more combative and muscular. Yet last
Sunday's performance at Old Trafford contained too many echoes of the
thrashings suffered against Manchester City (twice), Arsenal and Liverpool
last season . It means that many fans already fear nothing has changed on
the pitch, even if so much has been altered off it.
True enough, Jose Mourinho's side were bursting with power and purpose
following the arrival of Romelu Lukaku and Nemanja Matic. It just made West
Ham's collapse all the more inevitable in what is supposed to be the world's
most competitive league. The Hammers' long injury list was irrelevant, too.
This is a squad game nowadays. Southampton are not from the newly-minted Big
Seven. And West Ham won 3-1 there last February. But they are a club with a
detailed sense of structure, mission, identity and talent production similar
to the ideas cherished by supporters in east London. West Ham won't play at
home for more than three weeks - until September 11 - in the aftermath of
the world athletics championship. Even that is somehow typical of the club's
haphazard ways. So they urgently need to change the mood around them at
Southampton. Or the West Ham Way so embarrassingly on display last weekend
could become a bad habit this season.
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Portuguese media deliver major update on West Ham's bid to sign William
Carvalho from Sporting
The Hammers are desperate to land their man
Football London
BYALASDAIR GOLD
05:30, 18 AUG 2017
West Ham United boss Slaven Bilic has made Sporting Lisbon star William
Carvalho his number one target this summer but talks appear to be on hiatus,
according to the Portuguese media. The reports claim that the midfielder is
also struggling with injury currently, having missed Sporting's last match
with a shoulder injury and has now picked up a new knock that could keep him
out for longer. Portuguese media outlet Record also claim that the Hammers
will come back with a £36.4m bid, including add ons for the player, with the
Lisbon outfit holding a sell on fee as well. The report states that West Ham
must sell players before being able to afford to make such a move and for
that reason the move is currently on hold, although Record also write that
Carvalho is the only midfielder Bilic wants to sign this summer.
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Dramas involving Diego Costa and Philippe Coutinho show player power is a
problem in the Premier League, claims West Ham boss Slaven Bilic
Diego Costa is currently exiled following a fall-out with Chelsea's Antonio
Conte
Barcelona target Philippe Coutinho has handed in a transfer request at
Liverpool
Slaven Bilic said: 'I never advise or ask the players to stop training.
That's low'
By Kieran Gill for MailOnline
PUBLISHED: 01:35, 18 August 2017 | UPDATED: 01:36, 18 August 2017
Player power has become a problem in the Premier League amid the sagas
surrounding Chelsea's Diego Costa and Liverpool's Philippe Coutinho,
according to Slaven Bilic. West Ham boss Bilic expressed sympathy for Jurgen
Klopp and Antonio Conte on Thursday, having experienced a similar situation
with wantaway Dimitri Payet last season. The France winger went on strike to
force a move to Marseille for £25million and Bilic will hope there are no
tantrums from Manuel Lanzini as the Argentinian attracts interest from
Liverpool.
Lanzini is due to return to first-team training on Monday before hopefully
being included in the squad for Newcastle United following his knee injury.
As reported by Sportsmail last week, the club still want to tie the
£35,000-a-week winger down to a new and improved deal. Speaking on Thursday
about the likes of Costa and Coutinho, Bilic said: 'The power is too much on
the side of the players and their agents. 'It's hard for the managers. Make
no mistake, we are sometimes on this side and sometimes the other side. But
I never, ever advise or ask the players to stop training. That's low. That
is low. It should not be like that. 'The most important thing is that you
are on the same line as your board, then you are strong. 'It's a club
problem but at the end of the day, it's the manager's problem. It' s
happening now with Coutinho, with (Antonio) Conte and Costa or whoever. It's
a problem for the manager. 'Is it hard? It is very hard. Is it becoming
every year harder? But that's why I say the football game is very simple but
the manager's job is very complicated. And that's it. 'I know that I got a
lot of praise for the (Payet) situation but I spoke to my staff, my family,
"Why are they praising me for that because it was very logical thing to do?"
I couldn't do any different.'
Bilic is waiting for the thumbs up from co-chairman David Sullivan that he
has Sporting Lisbon's £36m-rated midfielder William Carvalho, though talks
have stalled with other clubs now involved. 'It is very busy,' Bilic
conceded. 'It is becoming more busy in other clubs. I have left it to the
board, to the chairman, to the people involved in those ins and outs. 'I am
concentrating only and totally on our game against Southampton. We are going
to see what has happened there with ins and outs.' Meanwhile, Bilic
confirmed on Thursday that Michail Antonio will be fit to face Southampton
on Saturday, while Andy Carroll is back in first-team training.
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Slaven Bilic confirms Michail Antonio return for West Ham United
HITC
Shane Callaghan
West Ham United will have Michail Antonio available this weekend, following
a four-month absence. Slaven Bilic has revealed that West Ham United will
have the option of using fit-again Michail Antonio this weekend. The Hammers
have another tricky away day on the horizon as Bilic's side visit
Southampton on Saturday, six days after being thrashed 4-0 at Manchester
United. But this time West Ham will have the 27-year-old available, with
Antonio missing the last six weeks of last season through injury. The former
Nottingham Forest man was the Irons' top goalscorer in the Premier League
last term, and Bilic is delighted to announce via The Mail that the pacey
winger is set to return. He said: "Antonio is back, he's fit, he played last
week for the Under-23s. It was part of the plan and he looked really good.
He looks ready. "For this game, we're going to have 100 per cent Michail
Antonio back."
The East Londoners would've been lost without the ex-Brighton winger last
season and his return should not only boost performances, but morale within
the squad. Only two players - Dimitri Payet and Andy Carroll - scored more
than his seven goals during the 2015-16 campaign. He has 16 Premier League
goals his last 52 games.
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MATCH PREVIEW: SOUTHAMPTON V WEST HAM
By Dan Coker 18 Aug 2017 at 08:00 8 comments
WTID
Blast from the past
1st April 1907 – Edward VII was on the throne, Henry Campbell-Bannerman was
the Liberal Prime Minister and the first taxicabs with taximeters had just
begun operating in London. West Ham United, meanwhile, were defeating
Southampton 3-2 in front of 8,000 at The Dell.
The Hammers recorded victory on the South Coast with goals from 23-year-old
centre-forward Harry Stapley, 22-year-old half-back Len Jarvis and
25-year-old inside-forward Lionel Watson. Trialist John Patten and
22-year-old Frank Jefferis replied for the Saints but it was the Hammers who
took maximum points back to London. This was one of two goals Patten scored
for Saints from four matches but it still wasn't enough to win him a
permanent contract. Jefferis would go on to win two England caps and the
1915 league title with Everton.
Stapley (pictured right) was born in Tunbridge Wells on 29th April 1883 and
was considered something of a coup when, as an amateur player, he accepted
an invitation to play for the Hammers in late 1904. A schoolmaster by trade,
he had resisted the lure of professional football throughout a distinguished
football career with Manor Park Albion, Bromley, Norwich CEYMS, Reading and
Woodford Town. Slightly-built for a centre-forward, he topped West Ham's
scoring charts for three consecutive campaigns and, after then moving up in
the world to join Second Division Glossop, he was the Derbyshire club's top
scorer for seven successive seasons. His duties as a teacher prevented him
from travelling to midweek matches but he became the private tutor and
cricket and football coach to the Hill-Wood children (the family long
associated with Arsenal); Stapley served as private secretary to Sir Samuel
Hill-Wood when he became MP for High Peak. Harry Stapley died in Glossop on
his 56th birthday in 1939.
West Ham United would finish the 1906/07 Southern League First Division
season in fifth position, while Southampton would end up 11th in a campaign
which saw Fulham top the division, Newcastle win the Football League title
and The Wednesday win the FA Cup. Stapley would finish as the Hammers' top
scorer with 22 goals in 37 matches.
Southampton: George Clawley, John Robertson, John Eastham, Horace Glover,
Joseph Harris, James Bowden, Sam Jepp, Fred Mouncher, Frank Jefferis, John
Patten, Wally Radford.
West Ham United: George Kitchen, Bill Wildman, Bill Taylor, Tommy Allison,
Len Jarvis, Frank Piercy, Dave Lindsay, Billy Grassam, Harry Stapley, Lionel
Watson, Fred Blackburn.
Club Connections
Jose Fonte and Michail Antonio travel to the home of their former club. An
array of West Ham United's good, bad and ugly have also turned out for
Southampton:
Goalkeepers: Richard Wright, George Kitchen.
Defenders: Richard Hall, Christian Dailly, Joe Kirkup, Wayne Bridge, Neil
Ruddock, Bill Adams, Ian Pearce, Darren Powell, Albie Roles, Horace Glover,
Calum Davenport.
Midfielders: Bobby Weale, Luis Boa Morte, Nigel Quashie, Eyal Berkovic,
Robbie Slater, Paul Allen.
Strikers: Vic Watson, Justin Fashanu, David Speedie, David Connolly, Ted
MacDougall, Henri Camara, Alex McDonald, Frank Costello, Fred Harrison,
Walter Pollard, Arthur Wilson, Jimmy Harris, Jack Foster.
In addition, George Kay played for the Hammers and managed the Saints while
Harry Redknapp and Alan Pardew have managed both clubs.
Today's focus is on a striker who had a period with Southampton in between
two spells with West Ham. Iain Dowie was born in Hatfield, Hertfordshire on
9th January 1965. He was rejected by Southampton aged 16 and later went to
the University of Hertfordshire to study for an engineer's degree. On
completion he became an employee of British Aerospace, whilst playing
football at non-League level for Cheshunt alongside his brother Bob. He left
Cheshunt to improve his fitness and signed for St Albans City, then moved on
to Hendon. While playing for Hendon, Dowie was spotted by Luton who signed
him in the 1988/89 season, when they were in the First Division. An
old-fashioned centre-forward, he had a brief loan spell at Fulham before
establishing himself as a first-team player at Kenilworth Road in the
1989/90 season, when his eight goals in 29 league games helped Luton finish
seventh.
On 22nd March 1991, with Luton still in the First Division and Dowie still a
first team regular with seven goals from 29 games that season, he agreed to
drop a division to join Billy Bonds' promotion-chasing West Ham United for a
fee of £480,000. He proved himself to be a competent deputy for the injured
Trevor Morley as his four goals in the final 12 league games of the season
helped secure the team's promotion as Second Division runners-up. The
26-year-old Dowie made his Hammers debut in a 0-0 draw at Hull the day after
signing and scored his first goal on his home debut, a 3-2 win over Barnsley
at the Boleyn Ground on 1st April 1991. He scored in his next two home games
as well, a 2-0 win over Swindon on 20th April and a 1-1 draw with Newcastle
four days later, before making it three goals in a week in a 3-1 defeat at
Blackburn on 27th April. When the 1991/92 First Division season began
however, Morley had returned to fitness and Dowie found himself on the
sidelines until his £500,000 move to Southampton on 3rd September 1991 after
less than six months at Upton Park.
Dowie played alongside Alan Shearer and Matthew Le Tissier – two of the
country's highest regarded players in the early 1990s – and scored nine
goals in 30 league games to ensure that Ian Branfoot's Saints finished high
enough for a place in the newly formed Premier League, while the Hammers
were relegated in bottom position from the old First Division to the new
First Division. His good form continued into the 1992/93 season, despite the
sale of Shearer to Blackburn, as he scored 11 league goals. His tally
dropped to five goals in 39 games during the 1993/94 campaign, though
Southampton avoided relegation again, and he managed another five goals from
17 league games in the 1994/95 season before manager Alan Ball decided that
he wanted younger partners for Le Tissier in attack, signing Gordon Watson
and Neil Shipperley while dropping Craig Maskell and selling Dowie to
Crystal Palace for £400,000 in January 1995. Dowie had scored 30 goals for
Southampton from 122 matches in just over three years at The Dell.
Dowie could not save the Eagles from relegation from the Premier League and
returned to Upton Park in September 1995 in a deal which saw the late Jeroen
Boere move to Selhurst Park. The 30-year-old Dowie made his second Hammers
debut under Harry Redknapp in a 3-1 home defeat to Chelsea on 11th September
1995 and scored his first goal back at the Boleyn in a 1-1 draw with
champions Blackburn on 21st October. He scored the only goal of the game at
Sheffield Wednesday the following weekend before grabbing a late winner
against former club Southampton on 16th December. He bagged the Hammers'
first goal of 1996 in a 2-1 New Year's Day defeat at Manchester City and
notched an 85th-minute winner in a 3-2 home win over Coventry on 31st
January 1996, a match which saw the debut of Frank Lampard Junior.
Dowie scored the equaliser in a 1-1 home FA Cup fourth round draw with
Grimsby on 7th February 1996 but the Hammers would lose the replay 3-0 the
following week. He tapped in the opener in a 2-0 home win over Middlesbrough
on 9th March and made it three goals in as many games by bagging a brace in
a 4-2 home triumph over Manchester City. Dowie ended the 1995/96 campaign
with nine goals from 39 appearances in all competitions and was voted
runner-up to Julian Dicks in the Hammer of the Year voting as West Ham
finished in the top flight's top ten for the first time since the famous
1985/86 season.
1996/97 was to prove less fruitful, with Dowie's only goals coming in a Hugo
Porfirio-inspired 4-1 victory over Nottingham Forest in the third round of
the League Cup, a match in which Dowie notched a double on 23rd October
1996. Redknapp had broken up Dowie's previously successful partnership with
Tony Cottee (who had moved to Selangor of Malaysia) but his experiment with
foreign imports was not paying dividends – neither Florin Raducioiu nor
Paulo Futre, both summer signings, would be in east London by the end of the
winter. Dowie ploughed a fruitless furrow up front in the bleak winter of
1996/97 and had to bear the frustrations of supporters who also had to
contend with loan flop Mike Newell when Dowie was injured in January before
the signings of John Hartson and Paul Kitson breathed new goalscoring life
into the claret and blue strikeforce. Dowie's nightmare own goal at lowly
Stockport also dumped the drenched Hammers out of the League Cup in a fourth
round replay.
Dowie remained in east London until January 1998, fourteen months and 32
matches after his last goals for the club. He departed, alongside left-back
and fellow Northern Ireland international Keith Rowland, in the deal which
brought Trevor Sinclair to the Boleyn Ground from QPR. Dowie, who left at
the age of 33, had scored 15 goals in 95 appearances in all competitions
across both his spells with West Ham United. Twelve of these goals can be
seen in my video below.
Dowie spent three years at QPR, ending his career playing in defence and as
player-manager of the reserves. He was also caretaker manager of the club
for two games in the autumn of 1998. He retired having also won 59 caps for
Northern Ireland, for whom he qualified to play through his father, scoring
12 goals. He became manager of Oldham in 2002, knocking Glenn Roeder's West
Ham out of the League Cup at Upton Park, before moving to former club
Crystal Palace in December 2003, taking the Eagles from 19th place in
Division One to the Play-Off Final, where Dowie again engineered a victory
over the Hammers. He took over at Charlton in the summer of 2006 but left
before Christmas and became manager at Coventry in February 2007 only to
leave a year later. He returned to QPR in the summer of 2008 but was sacked
after just 15 games. Alan Shearer named Dowie on his coaching staff at
Newcastle when he took over for the final stages of the 2008/09 campaign.
Dowie was named as the temporary 'Football Management Consultant' of Premier
League Hull City on 17th March 2010 but the Tigers would be relegated with
one game left to play. Now 52, Dowie works as a commentator for Sky Sports
News. His niece, 29-year-old England international striker Natasha Dowie,
plays for Boston Breakers in the American National Women's Soccer League.
Referee
Saturday's referee will be Lee Mason from Greater Manchester. Mason refereed
the Hammers once in 2016/17 – the 1-0 home win over Hull when he awarded the
Hammers a match-winning penalty – but took charge of two West Ham matches
the previous season, those being the 0-0 draw at Swansea in December 2015
and the 3-0 win at West Brom in April 2016.
Mason refereed three Premier League matches involving the Hammers in 2014/15
– the 1-0 defeat at Aston Villa, the 1-0 home win over Sunderland and the
2-1 defeat at Old Trafford when he sent off Wayne Rooney, denied the Hammers
a penalty when Morgan Amalfitano's cross struck Radamel Falcao's arm and
disallowed Kevin Nolan's last-minute strike for a marginal offside. Mason
was also the man in the middle for our 1-0 FA Cup win at Bristol City in
January 2015. He also officiated in four of our games in 2013/14, sending
off two of our players (Mark Noble against Everton and James Tomkins at
Cardiff) and disallowing a perfectly good Stewart Downing equaliser at
Crystal Palace.
Possible line-ups
Southampton and England left-back Ryan Bertrand has been passed fit but
Virgil van Dijk remains unavailable.
West Ham United could welcome back Michail Antonio from injury, while Aaron
Cresswell could claim a starting berth. Cheikhou Kouyate, Manuel Lanzini and
Andy Carroll could return at Newcastle next weekend.
Possible Southampton XI: Forster; Soares, Stephens, Yoshida, Bertrand;
Romeu, Ward-Prowse; Redmond, Davis, Tadic; Gabbiadini.
Possible West Ham United XI: Hart; Zabaleta, Reid, Ogbonna, Cresswell;
Obiang, Noble; Antonio, Ayew, Arnautovic; Chicharito.
Enjoy the game – Up The Hammers!
Follow @dan_coker on twitter.
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http://vyperz.blogspot.com
WHUFC.com
West Ham's second test in the Premier League this season comes away at
Southampton. The Saints drew their opening match against Swansea and the
Hammers head to St Mary's having beaten the south coast side 3-1 on their
last trip down the M3.
Read on for all you need to know ahead of Saturday's fixture including team
news, players to watch and much more...
Where and when?
Southampton v West Ham United will be played at St Mary's Stadium on
Saturday 19 August 2017 at 3pm BST.
The stadium address is: Britannia Road, Southampton SO14 5FP
How to follow
You can follow the game live via our Matchday Blog on whufc.com, with
updates also available on Twitter throughout the afternoon. You can also
follow the match in different ways on our official Instagram, Facebook and
Snapchat channels!
Due to being a Saturday 3pm kick-off the match is not available for viewing
in the UK. For worldwide broadcast schedules, click here.
Audio coverage will be provided by TalkSPORT on TalkSPORT2.
Team news
Michail Antonio is expected to return to the first team this weekend, having
come through an U23s contest last Friday unscathed.
Andy Carroll and Cheikhou Kouyate are still out but the duo could be back in
time to feature against Newcastle in a week's time.
Sead Haksabanovic could also be involved after impressing on his debut with
the U21s this week.
Match officials
Referee: Lee Mason
Assistant Referees: Constantine Hatzidakis and Matthew Wilkes
Fourth Official: Neil Swarbrick
Meet the opposition
Southampton started the campaign with a new manager in Mauricio Pellegrino
and earned a 0-0 draw at St Mary's against Swansea City.
The south coast team finished eighth in the Premier League last season, one
point ahead of the Hammers, having returned to the top flight the same year
as West Ham - for the 2012-2013 campaign.
The Saints announced this week that Chinese businessman Jisheng Gao had
purchased an 80% stake in the club, so exciting times are ahead for
Southampton.
Player to watch
Having returned to action with the U23s on Friday Michail Antonio could make
his first Premier League appearance of the season for the Hammers on
Saturday.
Antonio - last season's top scorer - will be a valuable option for Slaven
Bilic to call on as West Ham look to secure a first win of the season at
Antonio's former side.
The versatile attacker brings pace, power and creativity to the West Ham
front-line and will undoubtedly prove a tricky test for Southampton's
defence if he plays.
Head to head
West Ham's last match with Southampton, in February of this year, was also
away from home but the Irons still managed to secure an impressive 3-1 win.
Despite going a goal behind Andy Carroll, Pedro Obiang and Mark Noble all
found the net to give Bilic's team a deserved victory at St Mary's Stadium.
The two clubs have met ten times since returning to the Premier League -
West Ham have won four of those and three have been draws.
Last five meetings
Southampton 1-3 West Ham, Premier League, 4 February 2017
West Ham 0-3 Southampton, Premier League, 25 September 2016
Southampton 1-0 West Ham, Premier League, 6 February 2016
West Ham 2-1 Southampton, Premier League, 28 December 2015
Southampton 0-0 West Ham, Premier League, 11 February 2015
How to get there
By car: From the M25, leave at Junction 12 and merge onto M3 towards
Basingstoke/Southampton. On the M3 exit at Junction 14 towards
A33/Southampton.
Continue onto A27 and then follow signs for the A33. Keep left on the way to
St Andrews Road and turn right onto Britannia Rd/B3038.
Public transport: Shuttle bus services run from Southampton Central railway
station to the stadium, in addition to the regular bus schedule, for a fee
of £2 for a return journey on matchdays. These are also available from the
Town Quay Ferry Terminal.
Those services will begin two hours before the match starts. The service
will be in operation after the match to take passengers back to the railway
station or the ferry terminal.
The service is not a numbered bus service and will simply say 'Stadium
Shuttle' on inbound journeys and 'Rail/Ferry Shuttle' on outbound journeys.
Ticket information
All 3,200 allocated tickets have sold out.
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SLAVEN BILIC'S SOUTHAMPTON PRESS CONFERENCE
AUTHOR: EXWHUEMPLOYEE. PUBLISHED: 17 AUGUST 2017 AT 3:35PM
TheWestHamWay.co.uk
Can we talk about injuries, is Mikael Antonio fit?
Yes he is ready, he took part in a game last week which was part of the plan
and he looks fit and ready to play, he has been training for two and a half
weeks now. He looks good and ready.
Kouyate and Andy Carroll started training yesterday as well, they have done
a couple of training sessions. We have to see with them because Andy has
had a long layout and Kouyate has had a few weeks off as it happened in the
first training session in Austria. Lanzini is training separately and is
joining in with the full squad on Monday. We should have a full squad back
for the Newcastle game.
Some harsh analysis after Manchester United?
You can't say it is Man United and make excuses we should have done better,
especially when it comes to the last couple of minutes. We didn't give up
individually but we know that it is not very smart. It is not the same if
you lose 2-0 to losing 4-0. I wanted to find the balance between
criticising and talking about what went wrong but we don't want to lose
confidence because of one defeat. We have looked good in training today.
We want to approach the game against Southampton in a positive mood, knowing
what we have to do to get something positive out of the game. Southampton
are consistent, not with managers, but with the way they are playing.
What is the latest on William Carvalho?
I don't know, we will see what happens with ins and outs it has become very
busy at other clubs. I have left it with the board and the chairman. I
concentrate purely on the matches.
Karen Brady said clubs are in favour of the transfer window closing early,
are you?
Yes I would like that to happen we agree with them. It has to be across the
leagues otherwise there is no point. Ironically it would put the clubs in a
worse situation because you will still lose players if clubs from abroad do
not have the same system. It would only protect us that no other premier
league clubs could take our players but it wouldn't stop them from abroad.
For me it is a great idea, some teams are losing 30% of their teams and this
makes it hard. So it would be much better if the window stopped before the
first game of the season and across Europe.
You mentioned Coutinho, similar with Costa, do you have sympathy with these
managers because you had the same thing with Payet?
Of course I do, the new window would stop this when the season started. It
makes it hard to concentrate on games because the window is still open.
Sometimes you are on the other side of the story but definitely it doesn't
help the managers?
Do players have too much power?
What is important and gives you strength as a manager and a club is that you
are on the same line as the chairman. This is very important because then
you as a collective group are more powerful, you have to be on the same
line?
Has the balance gone too far to the players?
You know better than me but yes the power is too much on the power of the
players and agents and it is hard for the managers but sometimes you are on
the other end of it. I never advise a player to stop training to force a
move that is low and it shouldn't be like that.
One positive was Declan Rice from the Manchester United game?
It is nice to have those situations, we never try to force it. He is a boy,
who is very mature for his age, who is very good for his age and is very
mature. He has got the quality and he impressed everybody-the West Ham
family. In preseason he played every game and he wasn't in the plans in the
beginning but he forced them. It's too early for the kid but he is
improving and he is doing really well. Definitely the reason, yes we had
injuries, but he came on against Man United because I was confident he could
do it instantly. He came on against Burnley, last five minutes, it was an
important game and it was 2-1 to us and we put him in because he was the
best option. I don't want to praise him too much, despite his family are
down to earth-he will stay focused.
Last season West Ham moved into a new stadium on the football side, Spurs
move into a new one this weekend what advice would you give them?
We found it different and it was only us. It happened to a few clubs who
have moved stadiums. There is no magic formula, last year Spurs found it
hard at Wembley. It wasn't always against top clubs. I am not too bothered
to be fair. They will need time to adjust.
Can I ask you about Joe Hart what impact has he had on the dressing room?
He has had a big impact, he is England's number 1 and he is very vocal on
the pitch and on the training ground. He organises the defence and he
shouts and we are very happy with him so far. We have two really good
goalkeepers.
Andy Carroll is back in training, is there anything he is doing different to
avoid the constant injuries?
We are trying as a club and him personally. It would be wrong to think of
the World Cup. Hopefully in 10 games we can build on that but unfortunately
with a long lay out you can't plan that long term. Our aim is to find a
solution that will make him long term fit. For that you need him to start
playing games. We don't want to rush him into a game against Southampton,
even though he could have a big impact from the sub bench. We don't want to
risk getting new injuries and we have to give him a short preseason before
he enters the pitch. Only that way could he try and stay fit and then he
can think about England.
If Courtinho does leave for Barcelona are you worried that Liverpool will
come for Lanzini?
Max emails me these stories straight away to shock me a bit. We spoke about
this before Manchester United, I speak to Manu every day, he is happy. He
feels at home, he feels liked. You can see it, you don't have to talk to
him, and you can see by how he is smiling and is happy. He broke into the
Argentina national team. So he knows if he plays for West Ham he has a
chance of getting a better contract with West Ham and playing for Argentina.
Is there a price tag? £100m?
No I am sure he is going to stay with us. He knows he is wanted, the
chairman and the board, he was on loan, and we took an option before we had
to. He was voted the players player of the year, makes you feel wanted. He
likes it here.
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West Ham boss Slaven Bilic sympathises with Southampton over Virgil van Dijk
By James Dale
Last Updated: 17/08/17 11:15pm
SSN
Slaven Bilic has sympathy for Southampton manager Mauricio Pellegrino over
want-away defender Virgil van Dijk. West Ham face Saints at St Mary's this
weekend with Pellegrino unable to call upon centre-back Van Dijk - who has
submitted a transfer request. Southampton maintain Van Dijk will not be
sold, but the ongoing transfer saga is all too familiar for Bilic after he
saw Dimitri Payet eventually get his way and leave for Marseille following a
drawn out impasse with West Ham. "I know that the power is too much on the
side of the players and their agents," said Bilic. "The power is massive.
And you can't say that we have to fight it. We have to live with it and we
have to try to find the best possible solution for the club. "That is the
best possible situation for the manager as well. "That's why I say the
football game is very simple but the manager's job is very complicated.
Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, on the pitch and off the pitch. "Of
course I have a lot of sympathy. It's hard for them, and sometimes you are
on the other side of the story. "Sometimes you are in the position that you
are getting the player, but it definitely doesn't help. It doesn't help the
managers."
West Ham vice-chairman Karren Brady revealed on Sky Sports' The Debate
earlier this week that 17 Premier League clubs are in favour of shutting the
transfer window before the season starts. Bilic - who insists Manuel
Lanzini will be staying at the club this summer - backed the sentiments from
his board, but believes the change must take place beyond the English top
flight. "Yes. It is mutual from me and the club," said Bilic. "I would like
that to happen, it would help everybody. "For me it is has to be across the
leagues. Otherwise there is no point. Ironically it would put the clubs in a
worse situation that you would still lose players if clubs abroad want them
and you can't replace them. It would only protect us in that no other
Premier League clubs can take your players. "The [Philippe] Coutinho
situation, it would not stop Liverpool losing him, but would stop them
finding a replacement. It's a great idea, first one I'm definitely like
'yes'.
"Some teams are losing like 30 per cent of their teams."
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The West Ham Way is now the Southampton Way, and the Hammers have to make it
work
JOHN DILLON
ES Sport
The West Ham Way? Remember that? It's changed so much. But one laughable
aspect of the way the Hammers do things remains steadfastly in place.
That's their weak-minded capability to roll over and capitulate against the
big teams (and some smaller ones) in a feeble style un-matched with such
regularity anywhere else in the Premier League. Already, the 4-0 humiliation
they suffered at Manchester United last Sunday has made this weekend's trip
to Southampton more fraught than it needs to have been. There will be added
scrutiny of the result and performance on the South Coast because of the way
in which Slaven Bilic's side surrendered at Old Trafford.
For that immediate reason, it is welcome news that the robust pair of
Michail Antonio and Cheikhou Kouyate may be available for the game after
recovering from injury. The team needs to toughen up. Quickly. In fact, it
makes this a good time to set aside all those fallacies about the Hammers'
unquenchable penchant for elegant, lovely football and about their
much-marketed Academy, too. It all happened decades ago. Those ideas are
actually practised with more conviction these days by Saturday's opponents,
who have a well-defined philosophy which produces young players and attempts
to create a technical style of play whoever is manager. Funnily enough,
they call it The Southampton Way. And it put them in eighth place in the
final table last season.
West Ham, meanwhile, have chosen a different path in their awkward new home
at the London Stadium. For example, it's been made clear by the board that
there will be little room for young players to break into the side regularly
in future. The demands of the modern Premier League mean they have to buy in
ready-made seasoning and experience, they say – with much justification, in
fact, given that West Ham see themselves as a bigger club than the Saints.
It certainly made good sense when Bilic signed the physically powerful pair
of Marko Arnautovic and Pablo Zabaleta during the summer It was recognition
that the team was seriously lacking strength as well as pace last season.
The pursuit of Sporting Lisbon's defensive midfielder William Carvalho -
once described as a new Patrick Vieira - underlines this idea, even if it
should temper the excitement which greeted the appearance of 18-year-old
Declan Rice amid the carnage in midfield in Manchester last Sunday. "The
West Ham Way? Funnily enough, they call it The Southampton Way. And it put
them in eighth place in the final table last season."
But having chosen this path – and added to the disgruntlement of many
supporters who despair at the changes in the nature of the club - they now
have to make it work. That's the trade-off required for the abandonment of
much-cherished Upton Park. So far, there is little sign of it.
To get things straight, the so-called West Ham Way was represented by the
tough, physical and honest attitudes of Billy Bonds as much as it was by the
deft magic of Sir Trevor Brooking and Alan Devonshire. It is Bonzo who is
the all-time greatest hero of the fans – even more so than Bobby Moore –
which is why the club, with all its PR troubles, should heed the campaign to
get a stand named after him in Stratford. True enough, all of those players
had more bad times than good. That's the West Ham way, too. They were often
seen as a soft touch. Especially Up North. So even now, it will be welcome
progress if Bilic makes his side more combative and muscular. Yet last
Sunday's performance at Old Trafford contained too many echoes of the
thrashings suffered against Manchester City (twice), Arsenal and Liverpool
last season . It means that many fans already fear nothing has changed on
the pitch, even if so much has been altered off it.
True enough, Jose Mourinho's side were bursting with power and purpose
following the arrival of Romelu Lukaku and Nemanja Matic. It just made West
Ham's collapse all the more inevitable in what is supposed to be the world's
most competitive league. The Hammers' long injury list was irrelevant, too.
This is a squad game nowadays. Southampton are not from the newly-minted Big
Seven. And West Ham won 3-1 there last February. But they are a club with a
detailed sense of structure, mission, identity and talent production similar
to the ideas cherished by supporters in east London. West Ham won't play at
home for more than three weeks - until September 11 - in the aftermath of
the world athletics championship. Even that is somehow typical of the club's
haphazard ways. So they urgently need to change the mood around them at
Southampton. Or the West Ham Way so embarrassingly on display last weekend
could become a bad habit this season.
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Portuguese media deliver major update on West Ham's bid to sign William
Carvalho from Sporting
The Hammers are desperate to land their man
Football London
BYALASDAIR GOLD
05:30, 18 AUG 2017
West Ham United boss Slaven Bilic has made Sporting Lisbon star William
Carvalho his number one target this summer but talks appear to be on hiatus,
according to the Portuguese media. The reports claim that the midfielder is
also struggling with injury currently, having missed Sporting's last match
with a shoulder injury and has now picked up a new knock that could keep him
out for longer. Portuguese media outlet Record also claim that the Hammers
will come back with a £36.4m bid, including add ons for the player, with the
Lisbon outfit holding a sell on fee as well. The report states that West Ham
must sell players before being able to afford to make such a move and for
that reason the move is currently on hold, although Record also write that
Carvalho is the only midfielder Bilic wants to sign this summer.
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Dramas involving Diego Costa and Philippe Coutinho show player power is a
problem in the Premier League, claims West Ham boss Slaven Bilic
Diego Costa is currently exiled following a fall-out with Chelsea's Antonio
Conte
Barcelona target Philippe Coutinho has handed in a transfer request at
Liverpool
Slaven Bilic said: 'I never advise or ask the players to stop training.
That's low'
By Kieran Gill for MailOnline
PUBLISHED: 01:35, 18 August 2017 | UPDATED: 01:36, 18 August 2017
Player power has become a problem in the Premier League amid the sagas
surrounding Chelsea's Diego Costa and Liverpool's Philippe Coutinho,
according to Slaven Bilic. West Ham boss Bilic expressed sympathy for Jurgen
Klopp and Antonio Conte on Thursday, having experienced a similar situation
with wantaway Dimitri Payet last season. The France winger went on strike to
force a move to Marseille for £25million and Bilic will hope there are no
tantrums from Manuel Lanzini as the Argentinian attracts interest from
Liverpool.
Lanzini is due to return to first-team training on Monday before hopefully
being included in the squad for Newcastle United following his knee injury.
As reported by Sportsmail last week, the club still want to tie the
£35,000-a-week winger down to a new and improved deal. Speaking on Thursday
about the likes of Costa and Coutinho, Bilic said: 'The power is too much on
the side of the players and their agents. 'It's hard for the managers. Make
no mistake, we are sometimes on this side and sometimes the other side. But
I never, ever advise or ask the players to stop training. That's low. That
is low. It should not be like that. 'The most important thing is that you
are on the same line as your board, then you are strong. 'It's a club
problem but at the end of the day, it's the manager's problem. It' s
happening now with Coutinho, with (Antonio) Conte and Costa or whoever. It's
a problem for the manager. 'Is it hard? It is very hard. Is it becoming
every year harder? But that's why I say the football game is very simple but
the manager's job is very complicated. And that's it. 'I know that I got a
lot of praise for the (Payet) situation but I spoke to my staff, my family,
"Why are they praising me for that because it was very logical thing to do?"
I couldn't do any different.'
Bilic is waiting for the thumbs up from co-chairman David Sullivan that he
has Sporting Lisbon's £36m-rated midfielder William Carvalho, though talks
have stalled with other clubs now involved. 'It is very busy,' Bilic
conceded. 'It is becoming more busy in other clubs. I have left it to the
board, to the chairman, to the people involved in those ins and outs. 'I am
concentrating only and totally on our game against Southampton. We are going
to see what has happened there with ins and outs.' Meanwhile, Bilic
confirmed on Thursday that Michail Antonio will be fit to face Southampton
on Saturday, while Andy Carroll is back in first-team training.
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Slaven Bilic confirms Michail Antonio return for West Ham United
HITC
Shane Callaghan
West Ham United will have Michail Antonio available this weekend, following
a four-month absence. Slaven Bilic has revealed that West Ham United will
have the option of using fit-again Michail Antonio this weekend. The Hammers
have another tricky away day on the horizon as Bilic's side visit
Southampton on Saturday, six days after being thrashed 4-0 at Manchester
United. But this time West Ham will have the 27-year-old available, with
Antonio missing the last six weeks of last season through injury. The former
Nottingham Forest man was the Irons' top goalscorer in the Premier League
last term, and Bilic is delighted to announce via The Mail that the pacey
winger is set to return. He said: "Antonio is back, he's fit, he played last
week for the Under-23s. It was part of the plan and he looked really good.
He looks ready. "For this game, we're going to have 100 per cent Michail
Antonio back."
The East Londoners would've been lost without the ex-Brighton winger last
season and his return should not only boost performances, but morale within
the squad. Only two players - Dimitri Payet and Andy Carroll - scored more
than his seven goals during the 2015-16 campaign. He has 16 Premier League
goals his last 52 games.
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MATCH PREVIEW: SOUTHAMPTON V WEST HAM
By Dan Coker 18 Aug 2017 at 08:00 8 comments
WTID
Blast from the past
1st April 1907 – Edward VII was on the throne, Henry Campbell-Bannerman was
the Liberal Prime Minister and the first taxicabs with taximeters had just
begun operating in London. West Ham United, meanwhile, were defeating
Southampton 3-2 in front of 8,000 at The Dell.
The Hammers recorded victory on the South Coast with goals from 23-year-old
centre-forward Harry Stapley, 22-year-old half-back Len Jarvis and
25-year-old inside-forward Lionel Watson. Trialist John Patten and
22-year-old Frank Jefferis replied for the Saints but it was the Hammers who
took maximum points back to London. This was one of two goals Patten scored
for Saints from four matches but it still wasn't enough to win him a
permanent contract. Jefferis would go on to win two England caps and the
1915 league title with Everton.
Stapley (pictured right) was born in Tunbridge Wells on 29th April 1883 and
was considered something of a coup when, as an amateur player, he accepted
an invitation to play for the Hammers in late 1904. A schoolmaster by trade,
he had resisted the lure of professional football throughout a distinguished
football career with Manor Park Albion, Bromley, Norwich CEYMS, Reading and
Woodford Town. Slightly-built for a centre-forward, he topped West Ham's
scoring charts for three consecutive campaigns and, after then moving up in
the world to join Second Division Glossop, he was the Derbyshire club's top
scorer for seven successive seasons. His duties as a teacher prevented him
from travelling to midweek matches but he became the private tutor and
cricket and football coach to the Hill-Wood children (the family long
associated with Arsenal); Stapley served as private secretary to Sir Samuel
Hill-Wood when he became MP for High Peak. Harry Stapley died in Glossop on
his 56th birthday in 1939.
West Ham United would finish the 1906/07 Southern League First Division
season in fifth position, while Southampton would end up 11th in a campaign
which saw Fulham top the division, Newcastle win the Football League title
and The Wednesday win the FA Cup. Stapley would finish as the Hammers' top
scorer with 22 goals in 37 matches.
Southampton: George Clawley, John Robertson, John Eastham, Horace Glover,
Joseph Harris, James Bowden, Sam Jepp, Fred Mouncher, Frank Jefferis, John
Patten, Wally Radford.
West Ham United: George Kitchen, Bill Wildman, Bill Taylor, Tommy Allison,
Len Jarvis, Frank Piercy, Dave Lindsay, Billy Grassam, Harry Stapley, Lionel
Watson, Fred Blackburn.
Club Connections
Jose Fonte and Michail Antonio travel to the home of their former club. An
array of West Ham United's good, bad and ugly have also turned out for
Southampton:
Goalkeepers: Richard Wright, George Kitchen.
Defenders: Richard Hall, Christian Dailly, Joe Kirkup, Wayne Bridge, Neil
Ruddock, Bill Adams, Ian Pearce, Darren Powell, Albie Roles, Horace Glover,
Calum Davenport.
Midfielders: Bobby Weale, Luis Boa Morte, Nigel Quashie, Eyal Berkovic,
Robbie Slater, Paul Allen.
Strikers: Vic Watson, Justin Fashanu, David Speedie, David Connolly, Ted
MacDougall, Henri Camara, Alex McDonald, Frank Costello, Fred Harrison,
Walter Pollard, Arthur Wilson, Jimmy Harris, Jack Foster.
In addition, George Kay played for the Hammers and managed the Saints while
Harry Redknapp and Alan Pardew have managed both clubs.
Today's focus is on a striker who had a period with Southampton in between
two spells with West Ham. Iain Dowie was born in Hatfield, Hertfordshire on
9th January 1965. He was rejected by Southampton aged 16 and later went to
the University of Hertfordshire to study for an engineer's degree. On
completion he became an employee of British Aerospace, whilst playing
football at non-League level for Cheshunt alongside his brother Bob. He left
Cheshunt to improve his fitness and signed for St Albans City, then moved on
to Hendon. While playing for Hendon, Dowie was spotted by Luton who signed
him in the 1988/89 season, when they were in the First Division. An
old-fashioned centre-forward, he had a brief loan spell at Fulham before
establishing himself as a first-team player at Kenilworth Road in the
1989/90 season, when his eight goals in 29 league games helped Luton finish
seventh.
On 22nd March 1991, with Luton still in the First Division and Dowie still a
first team regular with seven goals from 29 games that season, he agreed to
drop a division to join Billy Bonds' promotion-chasing West Ham United for a
fee of £480,000. He proved himself to be a competent deputy for the injured
Trevor Morley as his four goals in the final 12 league games of the season
helped secure the team's promotion as Second Division runners-up. The
26-year-old Dowie made his Hammers debut in a 0-0 draw at Hull the day after
signing and scored his first goal on his home debut, a 3-2 win over Barnsley
at the Boleyn Ground on 1st April 1991. He scored in his next two home games
as well, a 2-0 win over Swindon on 20th April and a 1-1 draw with Newcastle
four days later, before making it three goals in a week in a 3-1 defeat at
Blackburn on 27th April. When the 1991/92 First Division season began
however, Morley had returned to fitness and Dowie found himself on the
sidelines until his £500,000 move to Southampton on 3rd September 1991 after
less than six months at Upton Park.
Dowie played alongside Alan Shearer and Matthew Le Tissier – two of the
country's highest regarded players in the early 1990s – and scored nine
goals in 30 league games to ensure that Ian Branfoot's Saints finished high
enough for a place in the newly formed Premier League, while the Hammers
were relegated in bottom position from the old First Division to the new
First Division. His good form continued into the 1992/93 season, despite the
sale of Shearer to Blackburn, as he scored 11 league goals. His tally
dropped to five goals in 39 games during the 1993/94 campaign, though
Southampton avoided relegation again, and he managed another five goals from
17 league games in the 1994/95 season before manager Alan Ball decided that
he wanted younger partners for Le Tissier in attack, signing Gordon Watson
and Neil Shipperley while dropping Craig Maskell and selling Dowie to
Crystal Palace for £400,000 in January 1995. Dowie had scored 30 goals for
Southampton from 122 matches in just over three years at The Dell.
Dowie could not save the Eagles from relegation from the Premier League and
returned to Upton Park in September 1995 in a deal which saw the late Jeroen
Boere move to Selhurst Park. The 30-year-old Dowie made his second Hammers
debut under Harry Redknapp in a 3-1 home defeat to Chelsea on 11th September
1995 and scored his first goal back at the Boleyn in a 1-1 draw with
champions Blackburn on 21st October. He scored the only goal of the game at
Sheffield Wednesday the following weekend before grabbing a late winner
against former club Southampton on 16th December. He bagged the Hammers'
first goal of 1996 in a 2-1 New Year's Day defeat at Manchester City and
notched an 85th-minute winner in a 3-2 home win over Coventry on 31st
January 1996, a match which saw the debut of Frank Lampard Junior.
Dowie scored the equaliser in a 1-1 home FA Cup fourth round draw with
Grimsby on 7th February 1996 but the Hammers would lose the replay 3-0 the
following week. He tapped in the opener in a 2-0 home win over Middlesbrough
on 9th March and made it three goals in as many games by bagging a brace in
a 4-2 home triumph over Manchester City. Dowie ended the 1995/96 campaign
with nine goals from 39 appearances in all competitions and was voted
runner-up to Julian Dicks in the Hammer of the Year voting as West Ham
finished in the top flight's top ten for the first time since the famous
1985/86 season.
1996/97 was to prove less fruitful, with Dowie's only goals coming in a Hugo
Porfirio-inspired 4-1 victory over Nottingham Forest in the third round of
the League Cup, a match in which Dowie notched a double on 23rd October
1996. Redknapp had broken up Dowie's previously successful partnership with
Tony Cottee (who had moved to Selangor of Malaysia) but his experiment with
foreign imports was not paying dividends – neither Florin Raducioiu nor
Paulo Futre, both summer signings, would be in east London by the end of the
winter. Dowie ploughed a fruitless furrow up front in the bleak winter of
1996/97 and had to bear the frustrations of supporters who also had to
contend with loan flop Mike Newell when Dowie was injured in January before
the signings of John Hartson and Paul Kitson breathed new goalscoring life
into the claret and blue strikeforce. Dowie's nightmare own goal at lowly
Stockport also dumped the drenched Hammers out of the League Cup in a fourth
round replay.
Dowie remained in east London until January 1998, fourteen months and 32
matches after his last goals for the club. He departed, alongside left-back
and fellow Northern Ireland international Keith Rowland, in the deal which
brought Trevor Sinclair to the Boleyn Ground from QPR. Dowie, who left at
the age of 33, had scored 15 goals in 95 appearances in all competitions
across both his spells with West Ham United. Twelve of these goals can be
seen in my video below.
Dowie spent three years at QPR, ending his career playing in defence and as
player-manager of the reserves. He was also caretaker manager of the club
for two games in the autumn of 1998. He retired having also won 59 caps for
Northern Ireland, for whom he qualified to play through his father, scoring
12 goals. He became manager of Oldham in 2002, knocking Glenn Roeder's West
Ham out of the League Cup at Upton Park, before moving to former club
Crystal Palace in December 2003, taking the Eagles from 19th place in
Division One to the Play-Off Final, where Dowie again engineered a victory
over the Hammers. He took over at Charlton in the summer of 2006 but left
before Christmas and became manager at Coventry in February 2007 only to
leave a year later. He returned to QPR in the summer of 2008 but was sacked
after just 15 games. Alan Shearer named Dowie on his coaching staff at
Newcastle when he took over for the final stages of the 2008/09 campaign.
Dowie was named as the temporary 'Football Management Consultant' of Premier
League Hull City on 17th March 2010 but the Tigers would be relegated with
one game left to play. Now 52, Dowie works as a commentator for Sky Sports
News. His niece, 29-year-old England international striker Natasha Dowie,
plays for Boston Breakers in the American National Women's Soccer League.
Referee
Saturday's referee will be Lee Mason from Greater Manchester. Mason refereed
the Hammers once in 2016/17 – the 1-0 home win over Hull when he awarded the
Hammers a match-winning penalty – but took charge of two West Ham matches
the previous season, those being the 0-0 draw at Swansea in December 2015
and the 3-0 win at West Brom in April 2016.
Mason refereed three Premier League matches involving the Hammers in 2014/15
– the 1-0 defeat at Aston Villa, the 1-0 home win over Sunderland and the
2-1 defeat at Old Trafford when he sent off Wayne Rooney, denied the Hammers
a penalty when Morgan Amalfitano's cross struck Radamel Falcao's arm and
disallowed Kevin Nolan's last-minute strike for a marginal offside. Mason
was also the man in the middle for our 1-0 FA Cup win at Bristol City in
January 2015. He also officiated in four of our games in 2013/14, sending
off two of our players (Mark Noble against Everton and James Tomkins at
Cardiff) and disallowing a perfectly good Stewart Downing equaliser at
Crystal Palace.
Possible line-ups
Southampton and England left-back Ryan Bertrand has been passed fit but
Virgil van Dijk remains unavailable.
West Ham United could welcome back Michail Antonio from injury, while Aaron
Cresswell could claim a starting berth. Cheikhou Kouyate, Manuel Lanzini and
Andy Carroll could return at Newcastle next weekend.
Possible Southampton XI: Forster; Soares, Stephens, Yoshida, Bertrand;
Romeu, Ward-Prowse; Redmond, Davis, Tadic; Gabbiadini.
Possible West Ham United XI: Hart; Zabaleta, Reid, Ogbonna, Cresswell;
Obiang, Noble; Antonio, Ayew, Arnautovic; Chicharito.
Enjoy the game – Up The Hammers!
Follow @dan_coker on twitter.
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