I have stuck by Sam Allardyce all season at West Ham while many of my friends and other supporters have always got on his back. He got us promoted at the first time of asking and we WERE comfortable in the Premier League. But we are now getting closer and closer to being dragged into this relegation battle and decisions like he made last night really makes me start to question him.
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So against Tottenham Hotspur, a team we haven’t beaten in years, we are winning 2-1 with twenty minutes to go and Big Sam decides to change the back four and bring on Emanuel Pogatetz. Why??? This decision completely ruined the team. It meant Joey O’Brien who was doing well at left back, moving him over to right back and putting Pogatetz left back. I think everyone in the stadium did not understand what he was doing one little bit.
The moment he brought him on Tottenham targeted him and put Gareth Bale right midfield. He just looked out of sorts from the first moment the ball was down his side and it looked like he didn’t know what he was doing. Then within five minutes he gave away a stupid free kick against Bale as he was getting done down the outside. From this resulting free kick Tottenham got their second and the equaliser.
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What I noticed after they scored the goal was that James Collins and Winston Reid were both going mad at Pogatetz. The thing is it is not his fault at the end of the day was a poor decision from Allardyce to bring him on at such an important point of such a massive game. At the end of the day he simply isn’t good enough and he shouldn’t have been put in that position.
Then from this moment on Tottenham were all over us and I don’t think it surprised any West Ham fan that Spurs got the winner. The game just changed in an instance and it looked like the determination and confidence from the players just seem to go right out of their system and all the attacking was against us and we just couldn’t keep the ball.
The next thing that I didn’t understand was taking off Diame?
You would think Allardyce would now have learnt that it is in the best interest of West Ham to keep Diame on the pitch at all costs. He might not have had the greatest of games last night but he does a lot of little things that people don’t notice. He gets in great positions when defending and will always break up play and then he has that drive about him to run with the ball and take the team forward. Looking back on two games earlier in the season against Chelsea and Liverpool. Against Chelsea he came on at half time, changed the game and we went on to win 3-1. Against Liverpool at home we were 2-1 up and he went off and we lost 3-2. I know in that game he was injured and had to go off but it just shows how important he is to the team and that he balances everything out in the squad.
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It would be really nice for Big Sam to come out and say he made a mistake changing the defence at such big moment in the game but it will never happen.
When we lost at home to Tottenham at home in the last minute it worked wonders for us and we went on a run that kept us in the Premier League. Lets hope we can do the same this season and push up the league and away from the relegation zone.
By Sam Hodges – @hodges_journo
Spurs fan here – the change did seem to do you no favours at all.
Still, it was a good game. Good luck for the rest of the season, I personally hope you stay up.
It was like going back into the dark ages. Non stop route one up to a donkey, but due to the keeper and some poor finishing by Spurs it nearly worked. I actually think Big Sam thought West Ham played well. I reckon he’s going to get even more route 1 (if that’s possible). Very sad
Actually he got it wrong from the first substitution. Nolan off, Vaz Te on, slide J.Cole in the middle. So Easy.
I totally agree
The problem with sam Allardyce is he doesnt get his teams to play pretty football, but generally he gets results. Any side he has left in the past has suffered relegation (Newcastle, Bolton and Blackburn) which suggests that he i good as what he does. He is a good manager if not one dimensional. As a Spurs fan I thoought it was a fantastic game which was made by what i thought was a good west ham performance. Good luck for the rest of the season.
Totally agree. But it was Lennon who was fouled leading to there equalizer. Lennon was not in the game untill numpty took Demell off and moved Obrian to right back. Then takes off Diame instead of Oneil. Then has the cheek to say its our best performance of the season??? The man is clueless and needs to stop buying ex Bolton players. Needs sacking even if he keeps us up!
actually it was bale he fouled
No it was lennon and he didnt move Bale right mid either
Not that important but he did foul Bale, Pogatez looked over his shoulder saw Bale and instead of shepherding the ball out of play tried to beat Bale for pace and freekick conceded. Pogatez also let Lennon jump in front of him by the corner flag instead of hoofing the ball out, not his fault but he is not very good. Another freebie that noone else wanted. Jussi, Gardner? O’Brien?
We actually beat Totts under Avram 1-0 with Piquoinne scoring the only goal.
As a Newcastle fan I’d like nothing better than to see fat Sam sacked again, Do Canio in surely? I’d also like to see fat Sam get relegated but not at the expense of West Ham.
Di Canio….auto correct on phone
I thought Nolan getting injured would do us a favour – j cole into the middle… Guess not.. God knows who he will play against stoke.Wonder if colli will get a start, maybe paulista on the bench? Can only wonder.. Probably will go with taylor and oniel so ineffective.
What ever happens with sam, di canio is a big no no.
I hope you clowns get relegated and go back to your rightful place in the championship.
Your just a small club with fickle fans
Pete the twit
Oh your so hurtful
got to get rid of sam,he is clueless his changes are stupid, no one would have changed our defence against spurs PISS OFF SAM HAD ENOUGH OF YOU, YOUR AMORON.
What are you guys doing putting up with Big Sam? I haven’t seen much of west ham this season, so I was taken aback when I saw the game on Monday. It’s was literally like watching a team from the late 1980s. Absolute stone age. Every free kick, even in their own half, resulted in everyone trundling forward into the spurs box and someone – often the keeper – clogging the ball 60 metres in the general direction of the penalty area. Utter garbage, that is not football.
West Ham is a proper club with tradition, the fans should not be putting up with Big Sam and his anti football. Better another year building a proper team in the championship than a few years of that crap in the prem. You’ll literally get nowhere with him in charge, just ever lower mid table, ever dwindling crowds until, eventually, a relegation that nobody will care about.
Hey guys.Steady.We lost because they had Bale and we did not.He is a great player.What I cant understand is this was pretty obvious from the start.So Bale should have been closely marked.Someone should have sat on him all night.The space and time and respect shown by the West Ham players towards Bale was worrying.And so it proved.Guys you have very short memories.Remember the end of 2010/2011 season.How did Big Sam manage to bring us back.He has done a great job so far in a very difficult situation.I confident we will stay up and Sam will remain.Bring on Stoke!Oh yes we missed some good chances as well remember Taylors miss at 2-1?
Oh Wellington. Your rose tinted glasses don’t help. Tottenham created chance after chance playing proper football and the keeper kept West Ham in it. Bale did the business in the end, but if that was West Ham’s best performance – lumping up to a non scoring donkey (and thanks Carroll for pointing out that you have scored 2 goals this year – good effort btw) then you have serious problems.Good players will not play football of that type. You made Wimbledon look like Barca. Yes, Taylor could have made it 3-1 but Caulker had chance after chance as did Adebayor. Bale had several sighters. 6-3 would have been fair. I don’t want to patronise West Ham, but deep down all Spurs fans know they are a proper club playing proper football. Not anymore.
As soon as he brought on Pogatetz I knew we would be in trouble and I was right!!Sam is not good enough for us – virtually handed the game to Spurs.
Demel was injured and had to come off.
Which makes all other comment look pretty silly…
The call I heard was saying Diame was injured…
Where was Diarra? I know, BFS shipped the French international back to France in favour of O’neal. Thanks BFS for what you’ve done for us but time to move on at end of season. Football has moved on in the last two years and left you and your sort back in the dark ages even Players like Rooney are getting left behind. You need pace all over the pitch when attacking and defending high up the pitch, with players who have great composure on the ball who don’t just hoof it. For our great club to move on we need the olpympic stadium and a manager like Larson who should not be out of our reach ASAP. COYIS!
All these comments make laugh. You’ve got West Ham fans understandably upset about a heartbraking defeat and looking for any excuse possible (big sam) when the truth is we were beaten by a wonder goal from one of the worlds best. Theres even Newcastle fans moaning about Sam and then you get the odd ‘3 songs a game’ Spurs mug making a stupid comment. Bale was the difference but there will be no repeat of that next season because scoring from 30 yards is 1 thing but scoring from 1,000 miles away in Madrid is impossible even for monkey boy. COYI!!!
Tottenham won’t be playing West Ham next year
All 3 substitutions were wrong. Jack Collison for Nolan. A central midfielder who has just had a go up front for Wales so knew the same Nolan role. Pogatez got Mullered and doesn’t he learn Diame stays on at all costs. This was a vital 3 points lost and lost by Sam no one else.A parks team manager wouldn’t make these mistakes so how can he?
sam is crap
Sam’s Ok. ….. he will bring us back from the championship season after next. So relax!