We are now at the halfway stage of a season which will see a resurgent West Ham in and around the European places in the table come the new year; a remarkable turnaround when you consider all the strife the club were in this time a year ago. The summer signings really appear to have been the catalyst for the change in fortunes, with the likes of Alex Song, Diafra Sakho, Enner Valencia, Aaron Cresswell and others proving instant hits for the Hammers.
Yet for me, it is a player who was already at the club – someone who experienced all of the periods of doom and gloom during the previous campaign – who has consistently been West Hams standout performer this time around. I am talking of course, about Stewart Downing.
The man signed from Liverpool in the summer 2013 seemed to get his fair share of criticism from some supporters in his debut season in East London, which I felt at the time was unjustified. Whilst it is true that he didn’t contribute as many assists or goals that we would have perhaps liked, it has to be said that Downing’s attacking powers were largely inhibited by the defensive style of the team that was a feature of much of last season. But even then he always worked extremely hard in tracking back, and his crosses from the wing were often dangerous and accurate; the problem was that there was usually no-one in the box to get on the end of them!
Onto this season, and it has been a completely different story. Downing has been moved into a central midfield position in most of the matches, in behind a front two, which really appears to have freed him up and got the best out of his abilities. Manager Sam Allardyce deserves a lot of credit for this masterstroke – I must say I only ever considered Downing as a winger throughout his career. But the former Aston Villa man has taken to this new role like a duck to water.
This has enabled him to get on the ball a lot more, where he has displayed a great range of passing which I don’t think we had really seen from him before. The new position has also given him license to roam around somewhat and pick up possession in dangerous areas to take a shot on or provide chances for others.
Such analysis has been backed up by the statistics too, as only Cesc Fabregas has created more chances than Downings 52 in the Premier League so far this campaign. Of these, the England international has six assists to his name.
It has also been something of a goalscoring resurgence for Downing over the 17 matches he has played in this term. He has four goals so far, which makes him the Hammers second highest scorer. There has been a couple of real beauties in those strikes too!
So overall I have to give the mid-season award for best player to Stewart Downing. He has been the most effective and consistent player in my opinion, which is some going in a team where there have been so many success stories since August. The only question left now is can he continue in the same vein until the end of the season?
As that game commenced yesterday I felt comfortable in the fact that West Ham looked comfortable and we were looking set for a big win of at least 2 or 3 nil. It came as no surprise when the 1st goal went in. What cracker on the volley from Song, superb and would have been a contender for goal of the season, only trouble was, as you all know that that cracker of a goal, that looked good, was incorrectly disallowed with a late call from the linesman, in fact the score board was already reading 1 – 0 to West Ham when the decision came, we were all too busy celebrating to notice there was a problem, and then later, Winston Reid is falling over while his is adjudged to fouled in the penalty area? The score should have deservedly read at least 2 – 1 to West Ham, and not Arsenal. I am sorry, but that game was ruined by match officials and I don’t think Arsenal should take comfort from winning with games possibly arranged, with match fixing protecting the big clubs, like protecting the gravy train. Do we really want to join this filthy elite?
And now we have the Y – boys coming up behind us, what stentch is next? Watching West Ham is like watching an Irish story, the both of them never win! COYI