Days and days without West Ham matches to sustain us, so no better time to drag out the ‘positive‘ word. Easy to be positive and happy when you are not losing!
Rather that that ‘impartial’, ‘independent’, ‘partisan’ and...’nothing to do with us mate, we’re not really here.’ We’ve heard quite enough of that stuff already.
So putting aside the totally self-inflicted ritual destruction of Manchester City for a while. Let’s look at us, be positive, see where we are going in our quest to re-join the criminal fraternity that is the Premier League.
There really are plenty of reasons to be cheerful, as long as you can gloss over that disgraceful first-half at Millwall, that is. Of course it’s easy to find things wrong, but I’ll try to avoid that, for now.
Second in the table, best goals tally in the country, beaten only once in the league and with a backstage structure beginning to look organised, and without the interfering fingers of David Sullivan.
Our new director of football Nils Koppen did an interesting chat on the club’s Iron Cast podcast, chaired by Chris Scull, once of these parts. Nils has been to Prague to meet major shareholder Daniel Kretinsky and that went well.
He described what almost looks like a coherent transfer policy—unlike some previous efforts—and explained the data-based system, how they look to see whether an Academy player's career path would be blocked by a new arrival.
Koppen also revealed how they looked closely at a target’s character and ability to add to the dressing room atmosphere—again unlike some previous issues—and whether we are in lockstep with CEO Varim Varani, oh, and coach Nuno Espirito Santo.
None of that seems like rocket science, but this is West Ham. It’s almost a different language compared to some previous times.
Of course there’s still £200m to pay off on transfers, so let’s not get too excited about the January window during which we can expect a couple of targeted signings and a few out on loan. But the positive feelings we are getting during this long-winded international break, three weeks to reboot, to get players fit and to build on an increasingly obvious team spirit?
I’m all for that. Happy to see Arne Engels screaming at some grounded Millwall player, while there was allegedly a few punches thrown in the tunnel after that game. That’s more like it, lads.
We saw some of that fight at Bolton, then we saw a genuinely inspiring victory over Wrexham. There is something growing in that squad: togetherness, defiance, attitude, desire. So let’s keep that going.
It also looks like Nuno will want to play on the front foot, we’ll score more than you. He’s taking the risk of allowing our centre backs to play one-on-one with rival attackers without much defensive support in front of them. Yes, I know, frightening isn’t it?
But with the array of midfield talent, and the experience of Tomas Soucek and graft of Edson Alvarez seemingly back in the squad, there’s a potential of another five attack-minded midfielders to chose from.
Soucek. Alvarez, Engels, Divine Mukasa, Mo Kante, Lewis Orford and Soungoutou Magassa will battle for those two central midfield roles and wide players Jarrod Bowen, Edvin Austbo, Josh Ajala and Manor Solomon may also be thrown into the attacking mix.
Musaka has been elevated to the England Under 21 squad, a clever, silky midfielder now with a terrific engine. Kante has been outstanding, a powerhouse teenager we seem likely to be rewarding with a new contract soon.
The Athletic produced an excellent article recently, looking at the Paris-born youngster’s background. He has lost both of his parents in recent years and had to fight his way through Parisian lower leagues football. He’s showing great hunger and got us back into that Millwall game superbly.
All this, and Engels has emerged as a real find, potential Premier League standard. Celtic boss Martin O’Neill admits that losing Engels has contributed to the Glasgow giant's recent worrying form.
We are still lightweight up front, though. But Pablo has improved, while Taty Castellanos and Joel Piroe have plenty of goals in them.
15 points from eight league games is a good start. I’m told that if you get 20 points from your first ten games, you should get promotion. We have 38 games left, a long haul, and we need to average two points per game to reach something over 90 points.
But the next set of matches will produce answers. So far we have only played four of the top 14. We’ve now got QPR, Lincoln, leaders Swansea, Southampton, WBA, Cardiff and Blackburn in the next 29 days before the next international break. It’s still ridiculously close with four points covering eight clubs and six separating 12 teams.
I hope I can still feel as positive when we get to that point.
Will we have a definitive answer to Manchester City’s plight by then? Who knows. The current situation is damning, dreadful industrial cheating and seemingly very little wriggle room for the inevitable appeal.
That will mean a new, reconstituted three-man panel, one side picking their candidate and an arm-wrestle for chairman. I can’t see City giving up, they could then take their case to the High Court. But they have spent all week pleading their innocence, however unlikely that seems to be.
I have no intention of minimising their offences, I was shocked by the magnitude of what looks like cynical manipulation of the rules. They’ve been subjected to constant abuse and criticism since the leak last week, and if they lose the appeal I would expect severe consequences.
Although I have no sympathy for them, I can understand the desire to circumnavigate rules that make it almost impossible for new, rich clubs to break into the elite clubs. The red cartel, Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool are in an impregnable position at the summit of English football.
The likes of Aston Villa and Newcastle of late have floundered trying to break into the elite, with both forced to sell players to avoid sanctions. It’s almost an encouragement to cheat. And City have, seemingly, gone for that route.
The people I feel sorry for most are their fans, they are not responsible for any of this and they are taking the brunt of the social media anger. Some face-to-face abuse too, I’m told.
I remember how I felt during the Tevez saga, now 20 years ago. Some of our fans were not even born then, and you have to be 30 to have experienced it and have any real understanding of the issues.
But we were branded cheats across the land for the corrupt contracts that brought Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano to Upton Park. It almost cost us a points deduction and relegation. And had us branded across the country. It still comes up even now.
So City’s situation is not in isolation. We got away with it. And the crowing red cartel fans should not forget that their clubs have fallen foul of financial regulations. But I accept this is in a different league - somewhere City may well be themselves soon.
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