Away at Swansea was not a must win game for West Ham. The teams we must beat are Wigan, Villa, Reading, Fulham, Norwich, QPR – sides who we hope will finish below us at the end of May. Having said that, West Ham were dire today. Two goals were gifted to Swansea by utter howlers and the less said about them the better. The third Swansea goal was well worked and they could have scored more.
For West Ham there were few reasons to be cheerful. New signing Jarvis looks useful. Vaz Te will score goals this season. And Kevin Nolan was not sent off. That is about it. If Fat Sam Alladyce reckons that booting the ball up into the final third in the hope that it will occasionally find Carlton Cole and that, on his own, Cole can then score enough goals to keep us up, I think he is mistaken. Fat Sam’s Plan A will not work at this level and he needs to look at a Plan B sharpish.
Now we have a run of winnable home games. These do matter. Let’s hope this can be forgotten as a bad day at the office and that against Fulham next week at Upton Park we can get back to winning ways. As for Swansea…
They are, as I write, top of the league. They will not be there next May but they look like a top half side. They thoroughly deserved to win and play some attractive football. My only caveat is that one or two of their players seem unduly keen on rolling around on feigned agony after a stern tackle in an attempt to get a yellow card for a player on the opposing side. This is one of the most unpleasant aspects of modern football ( although there are many) and Swansea are too good a side to have to play that way. It is beneath them.
For West Ham…this feels as if it will be a long season.