West Ham Utd 1 Burnley 2 (03/12/11)

[liam_essex_hammer]

Upton girlie I'm guessing you was in the stb lower because I also noticed the spanish contingent, by the way the atmoaphere there was poor people seem to embarassed to sing or shout their support, personaly I thought cole and nolan ( I know nolan gets stick but I think his work ethic is good and improving gradualy) and faye had good games whilst rest of the team looked average for the most part but in spells looked outstanding

[indiehammer]

DavidGoldWHU David Gold
“@Sonichamer: @DavidGoldWHU tough defeat today. How bad is Taylor?” Couple of weeks at least. He's really disappointed. DG
13 minutes ago Favorite Retweet Reply

Typical isn't it? Matt Taylor has a near perfect injury record at the age of 29, comes to us and gets two different injuries in a row!

I hope it is only a couple of weeks though, I don't want to rush him back but he's an immense player for us.
The winter season has only just started and we already have Baldock, Reid, Lansbury, Taylor injured with Bentley having gone back and Demel not up to scratch yet. We can ill afford any more injuries.

[claretnblueglasses]

Annoying how opposing fans just jump on the bandwagon and say all we ever do is hoof. Burnley fans saying "**** football, good luck with your hoofball!", even though we played much better stuff than them today. We'll forever be labelled as a hoofball team this season no matter how well we play.

[indiehammer]

Annoying how opposing fans just jump on the bandwagon and say all we ever do is hoof. Burnley fans saying "sh*t football, good luck with your hoofball!", even though we played much better stuff than them today. We'll forever be labelled as a hoofball team this season no matter how well we play.

You're right, it's painful sometimes and at least one fan mentions it in 'Opposition View' every week. Sometimes fans have been right and we have played hoof ball all game long i.e. Brighton but in the games where we've mostly dominated through good passing football, i think it's just down to jealousy from other fans.

To be honest, under Sam Allardyce i think we will always be labelled a hoof ball team, not just this season. Because of the task Sam has at hand, he can't possibly play good football every week, even if he would like to. You have to change your style to match your opponents when necessary and as long as Sam plays a few games a season in the long ball style, he will always be seen as a long ball manager.

Another phrase we get from a lot of opposition fans is 'West Ham aren't that good', i really think some of them are expecting to see the equivalent of Man City or Barcelona. To be honest our squad isn't even as good as Newcastle 09/10.

[Cuenca 'ammer]

So we either played them off the park and didn't create a lot or they got 10 men behind the ball, gave us a lot of possession which we didn't do a lot with.

Thought I read we had a lot of shots but not a lot on target. Know we hit the post Collison and Cole the outside of the post but I don't remember hearing (tough with the crap commentary team) the opposing goal keeper doing much. Or at least that's how it "sounded." Where are the match stats please anyone ?

As for playing quality passing in the first half, again only having two idiots on the radio, one of which was Julian Dicks it was hard to tell exactly but the representation as maybe others who listened could attest, they overall comments were that we didn't play well, didn't do a lot of creative stuff and in general lacked ideas.

ESM who usually writes a pretty decent match report:

I couldn't find that we worked their keeper with a lots of shots but not many requiring top class saves from the opposing goalie. Or maybe I just read it that way. Again and it is a nightmare listening to crap commentary, but I can't recall too many times when I was oohing and aahing at the descriptions. Seemed like they were there to spoil the game and be thankful for 1 point and were absolutely delirious with 3.

Not saying that we should roll over team like these at all, but we must but more cutting edge and take advantage of the chances that we do create. That's at least two recent matches where people are scratching their heads wondering how we didn't win the game, Bristol City and this one. Won't be the last time I think. Usually second time around games are completely different, managers work out the opponents having seen them once live and many times scouting and watching videos. Hopefully we can come up with something a bit different too.

[Chrissieboy]

Without Baldock we lack pace and with Taylor out we will often lack good final deliveries and decent set pieces to unlock heavily manned defences. Going to be a tough December.

[Lambretta]

Typical West Ham that we catch up with Southampton by winning when they last lost and when they lose again and we get the chance to go top, we decide to lose at home.

Oh well. At least we're predictable with our unpredicatability. (yep, I'm part Irish)

[RyanWHUFC]

Without Baldock we lack pace and with Taylor out we will often lack good final deliveries and decent set pieces to unlock heavily manned defences. Going to be a tough December.

Which leads me to why didn't Big Sam give Sears a go instead of Piquionne when Taylor had to be replaced maybe he could play in the Baldock role whilst he is out and we can see what he can do.

[Posh-Hammer]

Without Baldock we lack pace and with Taylor out we will often lack good final deliveries and decent set pieces to unlock heavily manned defences. Going to be a tough December.

I reckon Baldock would of put away at least one of those chances, and we missed Taylor when he went off.

[wizzo_66]

Thanks for the report wizzo but your hatred for Linda is clear enough

The fact that you want a new LB in Jan - is that based on McCartney's form so far this season or this one particular game?

In my opinion he's been great this season if unspectacular. I could only listen to the game via radio today but the commentator said he put in numerous dangerous crosses.

Was he really as bad as you make out?

From what I have seen of him this season, he puts an awful lot of pressure on our centre backs by turning his back on the play and passing inside when a pass inside to a CM or even a ball down the line to feet is on. He didn't get anywhere near Stanislas for the goal yesterday either. I think so far this season he has been average, defended solidly in some games, but offered very little going forward. Felt that yesterday he was poor in too many areas in his game. We need pace in the team, and given Sam's chosen formations, we need that at full back and at RW/LW.

In response to the other posters re: Cole and Piq, I just call it how I saw it yesterday. Cole has been largely magnifcent all season, but I didn't feel he was yesterday, our good work in the first half was largely done by Noble, Faubert, O'Brien, and actually Faye bringing the ball up from the back..2 or 3 crosses flashed across goal that Cole got no where near, and he won very little in the air..Cole actually improved in the second half when the rest of the team went to sleep as a unit. As for Piq, he got himself into a number of great positions with the ball, having rinsed the full back and chose the wrong option, as I said in my original post. I stand by the statement that Cole is better coming from the bench, he seems to pace himself when he starts.

Thanks for the input as ever. I think we'd all agree we shouldn't have lost the game yesterday after making them look stupid for 50 odd minutes. :lol:

[jtsharpie]

Could Sam's obsession with changing the team every game be the reason we are so inconsistent? I know we have had a fair amount of injuries, but surely we would be better changing like for like. By all accounts, Demel and Dioup had good games midweek. So why the change on Saturday?

[steptoe61]

Piss poor finishing as usual.

[-DL-]

Could Sam's obsession with changing the team every game be the reason we are so inconsistent?

I would say four wins on the spin until we lost this one was fairly consistant...

[EvilC]

Could Sam's obsession with changing the team every game be the reason we are so inconsistent? I know we have had a fair amount of injuries, but surely we would be better changing like for like. By all accounts, Demel and Dioup had good games midweek. So why the change on Saturday?

Winning six and drawing one in our previous seven games is inconsistent?

[NorthBankAlliance]

Burnley done to us what we done to Hull, Coventry and Brighton, snatched a win whilst being the worst team.
No complaints serve us right for having one winger in the squad.
On a side note atmosphere was *****, suppose that's what you get for massivley overpricing tickets. And why have we stopped playing bubbles as the teams kick off and replaced it with a Tinie Tempah song, really builds the atmosphere that one.

[stormbringer]

In the first half we played very well,but the finishing was poor (Nolans miss) and why was Cole on the wing so much .?
Second half without Taylor and the very poor Piq on we looked a very second best to a strong quick Burnley side .
The 2 goals we let in were both poorly defended,the first Piq did not stop our old boy crossing which Taylor had done .
Poor team selection by BS (the team from midweek (2 droped) why? and poor subs .#
We could have started with Cole and Sears up front .
Collison is not playing well and could have scored in the second half.
Faubert ended up playing as a full back after O'brien went off for Carew,all in all we looked all over the place in the second half,and as allways when we get a chance to go top we blow it.
I've been to all the away games and the suport is fantastic ,we play without fear away from home ,yesterday the suport was not great, very quite in the first half and the team seem to get more nervous as the second half went on .
And Sam Faubert is best played as an out and out winger.

[RyanWHUFC]

On a side note atmosphere was s***e, suppose that's what you get for massivley overpricing tickets.

Thought exactly the same mate, it went a bit mad in the TBL for 2-3 minutes after Nolans goal but that was it, think Barnsley might be a bit better because of the cheaper ticket prices.

[jtsharpie]

Being told off.

What I mean is that the performances have been inconsistent, the style changes from game to game. Guess it could just be the sign of a great managment team who study the oppostion and work out where to benefit.

I just think a settled side would bring a better level of team understanding and benifit us.

[irving boleyn]

I am reluctant to blame our two otherwise excellent centre backs for the goals. They can only mark one each.

Two very accurate crosses to attackers coming from deep and Nolan and Faubert were the covering defenders I think...No contest!

It WAS Piq who had no idea about closing down Junior,

[TheAlmightyAmmer]

I find it mad that some people are desperate for Sears to start just for the sake of 442. He's scored 3 goals in 70 something games :lol: