Premier League Match 4 - Southampton 0 West Ham United 0

 

One Man Rampaging Front Line. Sign Him Up.

After yet another tedious international break, the season gets back into swing today with our fourth attempt at getting our first win, at home to West Ham United.  The international break saw England comfortably beat two crap teams in Hungary and Andorra and then concede a last-minute equaliser to draw in Poland with another Southgate masterclass of dropping deeper and deeper, not making any decisions and us conceding a last-minute goal. As far as Saints were concerned, he dropped his real masterclass in the Andorra game by playing Trent Alexander-Arnold in midfield and what was his first game ever of men’s football in that position.  If I was JWP and I’ve just been left out of the Euros Squad with my 300-odd Premier League appearances in midfield and sitting at home watching that, I would’ve kicked the television in and been on the phone to my parents to find out if I had a Scottish or Welsh relative.  Needless to say, Trent was absolutely shit in midfield against sub-Conference level opposition and was moved to his normal position at half time, when Southgate put Reece James, another right back in midfield.  The other Saints related news from the England camp was that Tino Livramento made his debut is a late substitute for the Under 21s, so as Gareth Southgate certainly likes a right back, we can expect him to be in the full squad soon.

Back to today and what can we say about West Ham that hasn’t said recently.  It’s a really interesting club at the moment because they’ve got an ownership of the vast majority of fans can’t stand, yet the team on the pitch is the best West Ham side, certainly in terms of league form, that I can remember since the days of Tony Cottee and Frank McAvennie.  David Moyes is certainly getting things right on the pitch and has built a team with strength and power right through the middle of it, which rivals any of the Everton teams that he built his reputation on.  A spine of Fabianski, Ogbonna, Dawson, Rice, Soucek and Antonio is very good and when you supplement that with excellent full-backs in Coufal and Cresswell and productive attacking players like Bowen, Benrahma and Fornals, you have a bloody good side on your hands. For me, they are a good outside bet to finish in the top four this season if any of the traditional big boys to drop away at all.

The big danger to us of course is Michael Antonio who most people forget, was on-loan with us once upon a time, after which he went back to Reading and we didn't buy him when they eventually sold him on for some reason - probably that Alan Pardew had left the club.. Back then he had raw potential and of course scored in the JPT final for us, but now he is the real deal, particularly against us. It’s always a bit of a relief when he’s injured and our game comes around but that doesn’t appear to be the case this time. Our defenders really have to stand up to the physical challenge today and that worries me slightly.

Usually when a team is doing well, nothing else really matters and the owners can expect to get a not too much flak from the fan base but I have to admire the majority of West Ham fans with their dedication to the cause of “GSB out”, with the GSB of course being the Dildo Brothers Gold and Sullivan, and Karen Brady. The scars of moving from Upton Park will not be healed in the short term and the new virtually free stadium will always be shit, no matter how many people you can get into it.  There’s probably a bit of an uneasy truce with the team doing well but one false move and it all kicks off.  That false move will probably be when Declan Rice gets sold.

Ralph’s press conference revealed that we have a few injuries with Stuart Armstrong not yet ready and Theo Walcott having picked up a new ailment. He also said that our new social media star Lyanco, is not yet ready but I would expect to see him on the bench. Lyanco’s social media has been amusing, not in a Mario Lemina way but actually in quite good way because he seems very enthusiastic and it’s hard to be cynical about that.  He has this rather curious nickname of The Gorilla. You would normally think that it would be good to play that sort of thing down until you’ve had a couple of decent performances for your new club but the guy clearly doesn’t lack confidence and is clearly mental.

Oh yeah, I wonder if the turnstiles will work today?  Update – they did!

The team announcement is another mind-boggling one with only Adam Armstrong picked out of the regular strikers and so it looks like we have Redmond playing up front with Adams, Broja and Tella all on the bench.  I mean, Redmond probably deserves to start after the Newcastle performance but up front? The good news is that Lyanco is on the bench, dressed in a comedy gorilla suit – ok, I might have made that bit up. West Ham have named the same side as usual with their recent expensive acquisitions, Zouma, Kral and Vlasic on the bench.

The first half happened, it was dull. There were a couple of half chances where our fullbacks were the architects. First of all Armstrong sent Livramento away on the right hand side and he swung a cross in which was too close to the goalkeeper and Fabianski ended up catching it and crashing into his own post and probably had a heart attack for a brief moment but he got away with it.  About five minutes before the break Salisu and Djenepo combined to put Perraud away down the left and he fired in a brute of a cross along the 6 yard line but there was no one there to finish it off. The reason for that was that we playing very very differently to how we normally do.  Basically, the defence was a lot deeper than usual and we were not pressing high, which meant that we were getting people forward from midfield. Romeu was sitting just at the back four as you would expect but the wingers were performing defensive duties mainly and the player who was supposed to be getting near the striker was Elyounoussi, who was having to try and time his runs from a long way out. Stalemate. Boring. Half-time.

Salisu: Bigger and Faster Than You

West Ham had their first big chance of the game as following our own corner, Romeu gave the ball away and West Ham broke quickly through Benrahma. He eventually found Antonio who tried a snapshot from out wide which McCarthy saved at the near post. West Ham‘s next attack brought a corner and we got very lucky as the Zonal Blocking Non-Marking Clusterfuck system went to shit again and both Dawson and Ogbonna should’ve scored but eventually the ball ended up with us and we broke down the right hand side through Adam Armstrong.  He played a superb ball to Redmond arriving on the left hand side but where a touch and a left foot shot was required, Redmond did his usual and try to cut back past one of the closing defenders and lost the ball only to regain it and then lash out over the bar from a tight angle.  Why take two touches when you can take seven and fuck it up.

Ralph is getting into this early sub lark and this time it’s the booked Romeu who goes off with Diallo taking his place and JWP moving into the slot just in front of the back 4.

There was a bit of a flashpoint over in the right back area as Antonio tried to spin in behind Stephens who held him back and both players fell to the ground. They got back up with a handbag each and started wrestling, with Antonio grabbing Stephens and throwing him to the ground. Though our chief shit house undoubtedly started it, Antonio’s reaction should probably have brought a red card on its own but referee David Coote, was always going to bottle it so it was a yellow each with Jack Stephens barely able to contain his laughter.

West Ham seemed to be turning the screw of it around 70th minute with Coufal making a rare incursion down their right and putting over a cross which Soucek headed over and we were indebted to McCarthy again as Livramento’s headed clearance dropped to Bowen who saw his first time volley acrobatically tipped over the bar.

Saints are creating nothing and they do need something different upfront and the next substitution was to bring on Armando Broja in place of Adam Armstrong. Broja’s first contribution was to pick up a decent ball down the line from Redmond and just trust his pace to get the better of Ogbonna as he knocked into the wide open grass and just went, leaving the West Ham defender for dead. He got his head up and played into the path of Elyounoussi who just couldn’t quite get there before the defender.

Broja’s arrival had lifted the crowd and Craig Dawson made an almighty bollocks in the centre of midfield and Broja was away again with just Ogbonna to beat and once more he just ran headlong at the goal, got to about 25 yards out and then skimmed a shot past Fabianski and saw it bounce off the far post and away.  The boy looks a serious player.

The introduction of the Slough Albanian has turned the game on its head and Saints were the only team that were going to score in the last 15 minutes.  Unfortunately, the closest we came was a corner from JWP on the left hand side which was met once more by Broja his header beat Fabianski but was kicked off the line by Declan Rice.

The last Incident of the game was Michael Antonio having a complete brain fart and launching into Djenepo on the edge of our own box, going in late and high and his second booking and off you go.  Djenepo’s clearance had gone straight to Diallo who was charging forward but Coote brought it back.  Fuck sake.

Well that was a strange game. The end result justified the means I guess but it was a slightly painful game to watch. We sat a lot deeper than we normally do which was to nullify the threat of Antonio in behind the defence and make sure that West Ham couldn’t break on us. Whilst that was a positive and it’s great to keep a clean sheet, it meant that we couldn’t get anything at all going in terms of threat going forward. There were no ball wins high up the pitch, which has been the Gospel according to Ralph since day one and instead we had to try and pass through West Ham from deep and we weren’t capable of stringing three passes together for most of the game. An upside of not chasing around like madmen to win the ball back in their half was of course that we had some energy left in the last 15 minutes and finished by far the stronger side against a team that is usually just too powerful for us.

Playing as we did in what was virtually a 451 or 4141 formation, the lone striker was Adam Armstrong and he is the least suitable striker we have for playing up front on his own. Armando Broja on the other hand looks the part in terms of physical presence, pace and directness. When he was thrown on for the last 15 minutes, he managed to hit the post and have one cleared off the line and we looks like the only team capable of winning it but that leaves you with the slight feeling of what might have been had we believed in ourselves going forward a little bit more and been more positive about it.

A couple of times we have breaks and just weren’t positive. We didn’t go for goal and we ended up delaying and then sideways and backwards. It will surprise no one that Nathan Redmond was the worst offender, managing not to shoot when clean through and giving the defender a chance to get back at him which of course he did. There seem to be a lack of movement up front for the first hour of the game where we had Livramento carrying the ball out of defence and eventually having absolutely no one to pass to.

Defensively we were excellent with Salisu and Antonio having a right battle in the first half, which Salisu won. There was no quarter asked or given and it was good to see them shaking hands after every coming together. Antonio tried to play down Jack Stephens channel in the second half and he got no change out of Jack either.  He did however get shithoused and let himself down by getting sent off. Romain Perraud had his best game so far and McCarthy behind him was excellent in dealing with everything that he had to deal with. A couple of dodgy looking passes to the defenders in front of him but they probably looked worse from where I was and what they actually were.  Apparently, it’s our first clean sheet for about 16 games and only our second one in about 30 which is certainly not to be sniffed at. I’m still mystified as to why KWP isn’t in the defence (imagine KWP are right back today with Livramento on the right wing instead of Redmond) but today’s back four was completely different to the back four that was first choice throughout last season, so fair play to them.

I never thought I’d hear myself say this a key component of their defensive effort was Moussa Djenepo, who did a very disciplined job out on the left-hand side, tracking Coufal whenever he got anywhere near our half.  It restricted him slightly getting forward and he was not often in the position to support attacks but he had obviously been given a job to do and did it well, lasting 90 minutes which is unusual for him. The wildcard today was Elyounoussi playing just off of Adam Armstrong. At international level he plays off of Erling Haaland which must be a little bit easier. Elyounoussi started well but disappeared out of the game for a large portion of the second half to the extent that I forgot he was on the pitch, before coming alive again in the last 15 minutes.

Tactically Ralph did something different today and we were all calling for him to have more than one game plan and now he has the options and I'm not just talking about the wardrobe.  Different players and different formations for different games are going to keep on happening and we are going to have to get used to it.  Today’s result justifies the means even though the football wasn’t the most entertaining. He would’ve got absolutely slaughtered if we got beat 1-0 or something so you have to give him credit for us getting a point which is what we would’ve all settled for before the start.  Because it was a new system. he decided to go with the players who weren’t away on international duty which is a brave call but once again the end result justifies the means. However, choosing to do without some of your best players is a bit of a bizarre one. West Ham had exactly the same team out that they’ve had since the start of the season and I don’t expect David Moyes even thought about giving Rice or Soucek a week off.  The early sub turned out to be the right call with Romeu (who was also not having a great game) on a yellow card.  I say that because Moyes left Antonio on and look what happened.  Ralph was not happy with the ref stopping the game for the Antonio incident and I can see both sides of this one.  On one hand, Saints are away and it’s a clear advantage.  On the other, it’s a red card for Antonio – what if we’d lost the ball on the advantage and then West Ham find Antonio who scores?

If I was a neutral, I would’ve been somewhat disappointed with West Ham. The best player is Declan Rice by an absolute mile and every performance like that will crank up the smile on the wizened old features of David Gold as he adds another million to the transfer fee they are going to ask for. When you look at some of the other players who have been getting rave reviews recently, you realise that when they are not given space by the opposition, they are not as good are you expect. Antonio’s first touch was usually dreadful and Soucek is another who has a similar issue. We stopped them playing today and they didn’t really have any answers whereas usually, we just let them fucking run riot.  None of Fornals, Benrahma or Bowen set the world alight either. David Moyes seemed happy enough with a point afterwards and had no complaints about Antonio getting sent off.

Having now played four fixtures that we usually get nothing out of and only losing once we now have to get our first win from somewhere. Next week, of course we’ve got fucking Manchester City away from home. Great. It’ll be interesting to see what tactical masterclass Ralph comes up with for that game. If you asked me now I’d settle for anything that keeps the score down.