Michail Antonio's suggestion that fellow forward Gianluca Scamacca is struggling to settle into the club has not exactly been received positively by West Ham supporters.
Speaking on the Filthy Fellas podcast, West Ham's number nine was asked for his thoughts on the Italian international, who has been out of action for several weeks."I'm going to be honest with you lot," he said. "He [Scamacca] is actually quality. He is a quality player.
"The problem is, he can't play the way the gaffer plays. He needs a different type of manager to play his type of football. He needs a manager [for whom] he can play and have other players come off him and stuff like that.
"You can see, the ball comes into him and it sticks, he's tidy. But how David Moyes plays is more like if you're up front, you're dealing with scraps. You've got to be more of a fighter - and that's not him."
Antonio's latest media interview led to many fans criticising both the timing of it - being published just one week before the Conference League Final - and the nature of his comments, with some slamming him for being critical of a fellow player.
"The guy knows exactly what he is doing and right before our biggest game in 30 odd years," wrote Pob, posting on the KUMB Forum. "He is shameless in his own self promotion - the story is even top in the Daily Mail Online sport section. It's ridiculous behaviour. About Scammacca, if that's not questioning a fellow professional's integrity, I don't know what is."
And fellow KUMB Forum member woodford added: "It doesn’t matter whether it’s the truth or the biggest load of bollocks going, he shouldn’t be talking about a team mate publicly like that. It’s totally unprofessional and bang out of order. What a way to give some confidence to our expensive striker, who looks like he needs an arm around him. It’s so stupid."
Meanwhile other supporters urged the club to let Antonio go following this latest controversy. "I love Iron Mike, but he is either too stupid to realise what he is saying or worryingly does know, but doesn't care," wrote Clacton-ammer. "Either way, get him out in the summer after scoring the winning goal [in the Conference League Final] and let him concentrate on his media career."
Antonio discusses Scamacca on the Filthy Fellas podcast
However not all fans were as dismissive; sutts07 defended Antonio's comments, stating: "Antonio says that Scamacca is 'actually quality' and implies that he just isn't ugly enough to play the number 9 role for Moyes. I'm sure that Scamacca would openly agree, I also have no doubt that Moyes would agree too.
"He never says the way either Scamacca or Moyes approach the game is wrong, just that there is a culture clash there and that is the reason why Scamacca has struggled, despite being quality. If anyone can't handle the bleeding obvious being pointed out then they'd be better off not working under this manager anyway."
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