That Was The Season That Was - Part 1
- by Gordon Thrower
- Filed: Tuesday, 26th May 2009
So farewell 2008/09 then. How was it for you? KUMB took a bleary-eyed and exhausted look back at the season. Part one covers August-October 2008......
August 2008Jan Lastuvka arrives on loan from Shaktar Donetsk who cope with the disappointment of losing the Czech ‘keeper by going on to win the last UEFA Cup.
Kieron Dyer’s comeback from injury is put back by six weeks.
Craig Bellamy gets injured and upsets an Ipswich supporter by referring to her as a “****ing Ipswich prostitute.” Apparently she was from Felixstowe.
Fans are unimpressed as Ben Thatcher is given a trial as a footballer rather than as the accused. Freddie Ljungberg is asked not to come back, a fat cheque sweetening his disappointment.
Nigeria call up Carlton Cole replacing him with Ronaldo when it transpires that he isn’t actually eligible.
Keeper Rob Green moans about not being offered a new contract, forgetting that he’d agreed to discuss it at the end of the season.
The season finally opens, and the only new boy in the side, Valon Behrami, chalks up an assist as a lacklustre Hammers hold on to beat Wigan 2-1. Dean Ashton scores a brace but limps off with a calf injury.
The club announces that a bid for Anton Ferdinand from Sunderland has been accepted, a deal that has major repercussions a bit later on.
Mark Noble sees red as a poor display at Eastlands sees us lose 3-0 to Manchester City. Carlton Cole’s turn to get injured after half an hour.
Anton Ferdinand signs for Sunderland and denies having turned down an improved contract.
Results, improve with consecutive 4-1 wins over Macclesfield and a Paul Ince-led Blackburn. Bellamy is on the scoresheet and Green saves a spot-kick. Ince struggles on until December before being sacked. Nobody is upset.
The transfer window closes with the departure of George McCartney who, following another statement from the board, denies having submitted a transfer request. Some 19 hours after the window has shut the club remembers it has signed two players on loan: Herita Ilunga comes in at left-back from Tolouse and striker David Di Michele arrives from Torino. The official explanation for the delay is that international clearance hasn’t arrived – though wags suggested that they were waiting to tell Curbishley first.
September 2008
Curbishley resigns citing “irreconcilable” differences between him and the board over transfer policy. He later goes on to take legal action against the club for constructive dismissal.
Slaven Bilic and Harry Redknapp are early front-runners in the betting over Curbishley’s replacement. Paulo Di Canio throws his hat into the ring but few consider him seriously.
A shortlist of 6 arises, including Bilic, Gerard Houllier, Roberto Donadoni, Roberto Mancini, Gianfranco Zola and an unnamed mystery 6th person.
Free agent Walter Lopez arrives from Uruguay without knowing who his new manager is to be. He spends the season as back-up to Ilunga.
The managerial shortlist is whittled down as Michael Laudrup – the previously un-named mystery man – heads off to Moscow. The remaining three still in contention are said to be Bilic, Donadoni and Zola.
Eventually Gianfranco Zola is named as manager. Concerns that fans may be worried about his Chelsea connections are soon quelled. As one fan put it: “You can’t blame the man for wanting to better himself”. Steve Clarke is another to go up in the world as he joins Zola to become assistant manager at the Boleyn.
Meanwhile all is not well with the club’s sponsors. The XL holiday group enters administration owing millions to thousands of holidaymakers – including your correspondent. If anyone from ATOL is reading this, any time you want to send me that cheque for £400 will be fine.
Kevin Keen (still aged 12) is officially in charge at West Brom where all is going well until a dreadful penalty decision lets the home side back into the match which they go on to win 3-2. The team turn out in shirts with claret patches clumsily covering the erstwhile sponsor’s logo.
The Zola era proper starts with a 3-1 home win over Newcastle. Dean Ashton has picked up a knock and misses the win. The claret patches have been replaced by shirt numbers amidst calls for Hammers to adopt the logo of the Bobby Moore Fund charity. The club cite a responsibility to secure the best financial package for not using the charity’s logo.
In a decision described in legal circles as “insane” Lord Griffiths decides, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that Carlos Tevez alone was responsible for the great escape. Clearly the concept of contributory negligence hadn’t reached his lordship who amazingly is still allowed out in public. Never has the old adage that if you repeat a lie often enough people will believe it been better exemplified.
Meanwhile, away from hypocrisy, Dean Ashton is confirmed as a long-term absentee as more surgery is required on that troublesome ankle. Carlton Cole becomes the latest footballer to be arrested for drink driving and faces the wrath of Zola who administers a club fine with the words “I may be nice but I’m not stupid”. Rumours that Cole wakes up with a horse’s head in his bed later in the week are not confirmed but he has behaved himself ever since.
On the pitch Hammers travel to Craven Cottage and dispatch 10 man Fulham 2-1 with goals from a suitably-chastened Cole and Matty Etherington.
October 2008
The month starts with the arrival of another free-agent on trial in the form of Diego Tristan, a former team-mate of ex-Hammer Lionel Scaloni at Deportivo La Corunna who released him in 2006. Unsuccessful spells at Mallorca and Livorno had ended amidst rumours of booze and a lack of fitness. The ideal person to give Carlton Cole a lift to training then.
Club owner BG is said to have turned down a bid for the club from an un-named source amidst rumours of serious financial problems following the collapse of the Icelandic economy.
Two uncharacteristic errors from Rob Green and a sadly predictable one from Mike Dean gift the visitors all three points as Bolton emerge 3-1 victors.
BG’s week gets worse as the Icelandic government is forced to take control of Landesbanki, the bank in which the chairman holds a 40% stake which now turns out to be worth less than I have down the back of the sofa at the moment.
Hammers try to take the ridiculous Griffiths decision to the Court For Arbitration in Sport, pointing out, not unreasonably that since McCabe has been able to make dozens of appeals until he found someone stupid enough to agree with him, natural justice demands that the same courtesy be afforded to the Hammers. Meanwhile, the papers suggest that McCabe is likely to up his claim to a possible £50m, a figure likened to claiming for a Rolex on your holiday insurance having lost a plastic Casio.
Tristan finally signs following an extended trial but doesn’t feature as high-flying new-boys Hull take all three points at the KC stadium with a 1-0 victory.
Somebody called Nigel Quashie signed for Birmingham on a month’s loan. No, me neither.
The run of bad results continues with a 2-0 home defeat to Arsenal, the second coming in stoppage time as the team went all out in search of the equaliser. Carlton Cole receives a late red card for a challenge that scarcely merited a free-kick as another referee fails to honour his part in the “FA’s Respect campaign”.
More court news as it is suggested that a number of Sheffield United players are considering legal action against the club over the relegation. It later transpires that many of them were actually on loan elsewhere at the time. Even more laughable, Phil Jagielka, whose handball would have sent us down had everything else gone to plan, and who had earned a move to Everton, a salary rise and a place in the England squad as a result of Sheffield United’s relegation, was also being linked with law suits. No hypocrisy there then.
The month ends with another defeat, this time a weakened side devoid of Cole and Ashton goes down 2-0 to eventual champions Man Utd. The result sees the team slide worryingly into the lower half of the table where only a few points separate Europe from the drop zone.
….and there’s still no sign of Dyer……..
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