I think it is fair to say that currently a significant number of West Ham fans are starting to turn against manager Sam Allardyce – I know plenty have never been keen on him – judging by Twitter, following our recent back-to-back defeats against Crystal Palace and Liverpool, quite a lot want him sacked.
There have also been a couple of reports in the media suggesting that our owners are losing patience with Big Sam, and are lining up replacements. Personally, I doubt there is much truth to these stories, and I think it would take a much longer run of defeats before they would even consider pulling the plug on Allardyce’s tenure at West Ham.
Nonetheless, pressure is starting to build on him after our poor start to the season, where we sit only one place above the relegation zone on goal difference, especially considering the good season we had last year.
I do believe Allardyce deserves criticism for this, and he has been guilty of making poor tactical decisions in quite a few games. However, I believe it would be foolish to sack Big Sam, and we should back him to steer us clear of trouble.
Firstly, we have had some injuries to crucial players this season that have been a severe blow. The one everyone has talked about is the injury to our record signing, striker Andy Carroll, who has been out of action all season and has only just returned to training. Without any other quality strikers in our ranks, our goal record has been extremely poor with a mere 13 goals in the opening 15 matches. We just have to pray that Carroll can start paying off some of our investment in him with goals when he finally makes an appearance in the first team.
I also think the injury to Ricardo Vaz Te earlier in the season was a big loss, as he is someone who is capable of pulling something out of the hat as he showed in his few appearances this campaign.
Another huge loss has been the injury to Winston Reid. Last season’s Hammer of the Year has been absolutely brilliant for us since Allardyce took over, and that form continued into this season.
To me our defence has looked noticeably shakier in his absence and this is epitomised by the fact that, in the 10 games that Reid played in this season, we only conceded eight goals, in the next five, we have already conceded 11.
These were players that we had available for much of last season, and Reid and Carroll are arguably the most important members of the team, who can’t really be replaced. Clearly losing the pair of them has contributed to our poor start.
Indeed any manager we got in to replace Allardyce would inherit these problems, especially the lack of strikers situation. Would anyone new we got in do any better with the tools he has at his disposal? I’m not so sure, bearing in mind these are players either Allardyce has worked with at West Ham for years or he signed during his time here.
The lack of decent managers available that would realistically come to West Ham is another reason we should not discard with Allardyce. If anyone has a name that they think would do a better job than Big Sam I’d like to hear it.
Allardyce, despite his faults, has never been relegated from the Premier League in the 10 years he has been in the top flight and he achieved this despite not managing particularly big clubs, with access to significant funds and often in difficult circumstances.
Yet he always found a way of getting his team’s success in the league, (with a fair few top half finishes it must be said), and in many ways he is probably the ideal man to get us out of relegation, with the experience and know how he possesses for these back to the wall scenarios. When I hear the likes of Glenn Hoddle being touted as a possible replacement, I just think ‘no thanks, I’d rather stick with Sam.’
I also think some of blame for this seasons woes needs to be laid at the feet of some of our big name players, who have significantly underperformed in comparison to last season.
Mohamed Diame has been a real disappointment this term, although it is fair to say he has been played out of position on several occasions. He has seemed strangely subdued a lot of time, in comparison to a lot of his all action displays last season that earned him plenty of plaudits. Indeed it seems incredible that this time last year we were worried about him leaving for a Champions League team.
Another has been Kevin Nolan. While his 10 goals last season were hugely valuable, particularly those in the early stages of the season, he has only found the net once so far this term, and that was on the opening day of the season.
Aside from the lack of goals, his all round contribution has been really poor and almost non-existent at times and as captain, he hasn’t led by example in any way. I think this was typified against Liverpool, where the only actions I noticed him for in the game was his crazy pass back which led to the opening goal, and then the mindless, vicious ‘tackle’ on Jordan Henderson which saw him sent off in the second. I’m sure I wasn’t the only West Ham fan half pleased to see the red card come out of the referees pocket, meaning he won’t be playing for three games. It has become that bad. And this is written as someone who has been a fan of his contribution to the club since he arrived.
In addition, we should bear in mind the impact of ‘second season syndrome’. This has happened to several good managers down the years, where after an initial good first season, there seems to be a difficult second, perhaps because there is a transition period where the team starts to get built more in the manager’s image, and other teams are better prepared for you.
For example, I remember David Moyes had a tough second full season in charge of Everton in the early 2000’s after a very good first, and many Everton fans were calling for his head that year. But they stuck with him, and he went on to enjoy 10 successful years at the club.
Another example is more recent with Alan Pardew at Newcastle United. After a brilliant campaign in his first full year, two seasons ago, where the club finished 5th and which resulted in Pards receiving the Manager of the Year award but only last season, the Magpies were in a relegation trouble and rumours were rife about him getting the sack. Now, this season, they seem to be reaping the rewards of allowing Pardew to keep his job.
Last year, we finished in a highly respectable 10th place before our poor start this campaign. My hope is that the stability of sticking with Allardyce will lead us to better things in the next year or two (assuming we stay up of course).
Finally, I would just like to make the point that our success last season was well and truly based on our excellent home form. We only lost four games at home last time out and accrued nine wins. In contrast our form at home as been poor this season, with four defeats already and just seven points in seven games. However, when you look at the teams we have played in those defeats, the record dosen’t seem quite so bad.
Stoke City was a real disappointment, but apart from that we can’t be too surprised at losing to the others. We seemingly always lose to Everton, and its no disgrace to lose to Manchester City and Chelsea. It is the next run of home games that we need to make the most of, many of which are very much winnable, and could make or break our season. Indeed, these are the types of games we were winning last season. The next run of home games are: Sunderland, Arsenal, West Brom, Newcastle, Swansea, Norwich and Hull City. I’d say we could reasonable say we need to target four wins from those fixtures. If we can do that we should be fine.
Ultimately, despite his mistakes this season, Allardyce deserves more time to sort our season out. We have been desperately unlucky with the Carroll situation and a with few other factors which Allardyce has had little control over, that have contributed significantly to our poor season so far.
This is really the first bad spell we’ve experienced under his stewardship, during which time he led us to the Premier League at the first attempt, and provided us with a stable 10thplace finish in our first season back. I think it would be a real knee jerk reaction to sack him now, and would be a decision that I think could well condemn us to relegation.
Behind your sentiments in your column all the way. Hopefully the owners will agree, but their history at Birmingham doesn’t back that up
Diame has been played out of position for most of the season so no, you can’t place any blame whatsoever on him. The injury situation with Carroll is entirely Sams fault and he has to be held accountable for that. The injuries aren’t even really an excuse as we started the season fairly well and our defence has held strong in the majority of games, it is harsh to suggest that letting in 4 goals at Anfield means our defence is noticeably shakier without Winston Reid. The defence were equally as shaky when City came to visit us at the Boleyn and Reid was present during that game so again I don’t think you can blame the defence and their record with and without Reid present backs me up.
The problem is Sam is tactically inept. He is very slow to change a system that isn’t working. He is very quick to drop players who are not his favourites but will never drop his absolute favourite Kevin Nolan and that is the real reason behind what is holding us back. Sam knows he can’t leave Diame on the bench because Diame is our best midfielder but instead of playing him in his rightful position he sticks him out on the wing which is pure idiocy.
If Sam had shown any willingness to change or any willingness to drop the worst performer of the season, Nolan, then I would agree with giving him longer but he hasn’t shown any willingness to do anything different. Not to mention the fact that everything that has made West Ham the club it is has been disregarded and thrown under the bus whilst Sam has been in charge, If we lose this weekend he has to go.
Just a couple of things I want to clear up in your response. You think Allardyce is responsible for saying whether a player is fit enough to sign for the club? Allardyce wanted Carroll, if he wasn’t fit enough to join, the Medical staff should have pointed it out, so that’s not down to Allardyce.
Diame started out of position against Palace, but after 56 minutes, Nolan was removed and Diame put in the middle. Diame proceeded to misplace passes for the rest of the game and was the shell of a player he was last season. Allardyce also changed his tactics early, as he did in the Chelsea game, when things weren’t working. I’m as worried as the next man, but you clearly hate Allardyce and will look for any excuse to blame him for our predicament. We win as a club, and we lose as a club.
Don’t humour me mate, your response is laughable. EVERYONE in the country knew Carroll was injured when we signed him, that was the risk Sam took and besides are you really naive enough to think that the manager doesn’t see the reports from the medical team and doesn’t take an interest in it all? One of the most ridiculous statements I’ve read on this site. Also, Carroll’s current injury was one that he sustained in training, we all knew Carroll was injury prone but again that is the risk Sam was willing to take and he has to be held accountable for the fact that his whole game plan relied solely on an injury prone striker being fit. The owners are just as mindless because they thoroughly supported the acquisition from the get go.
Apologies but using one game to illustrate your point is pretty childish. I could point to the whole of last season where Diame was confident, playing good football and thoroughly enjoying himself at West Ham. This season it is quite clear to see that he is fed up, as are quite a few players. You don’t need to be an expert in body language to notice these things.
I have had enough of Allardyce, we used to win and lose a club but we are no longer West Ham United. He has done his very best to ruin everything about West Ham and I for one am fed up, I’m not the only one. We will never progress further than mid table with Allardyce and currently he is not even achieving that. If you are happy to have a manager where there is no hope of genuine success then by all means continue supporting Allardyce and his mission but forgive me for having a bit of ambition!
We are going down and gunna lose diame, downing, Carroll and reid. I’ve never been an optimist wen it cums to whu. Always one step forward 6 steps back. Everyone just needs to get used to failure and accept its always gunna be a rubbish club that never gets anywhere! FACT!
I started to read your reasons for keeping Sam until you said Vaz te was a big loss !!! Really we couldn’t tempt a championship club to take him in August , Vaz te along with matt Taylor , jack collinson , George McCartney , are simply not good enough and would not get in any other premiership side , Sam done great to get us in the premiership ( all be it in a lottery play off ) it was right to keep him for the first season back as they were his players , his contract was up at the end of last season and we should have pushed on , 9 away goals in the league last season the worst goals scoring record I can remember has carried on this season , seems to set a side to draw 0 – 0 every match ( even at home ) the most boring brand of play I have ever witnessed ( been going for 49 years ) we will go down if not this year the next , we need to learn from hanging on to grant for to long , Sam will relegate us and it won’t be pretty
Frankly, I don’t agree with much you have written. RVT12 and Bob why are dead right and I echo what they say. Also, regarding our season in the Championship, any half decent manager would have got us automatic promotion. BFS’ tactics in that season were naive as well and this season he has excelled himself with tactics which have been little short of idiotic. I agree that the “no striker” situation is BFS’s fault entirely. What kind of manager, with any commonsense, has his only striker with any talent injured and then spends our limited budget on Downing? That is not a criticism of Downing – he just was not the player we needed at the time.
The other thing is this. In your article you mention the lack of Carroll and Reid as being the major contributory factor in our poor form. Of course those players are missed. But the point is, their absence makes it blatantly obvious that our club apparently has no decent back ups. Do we really have no youngsters worth giving a chance to? Why is Potts on loan?
In fact, I don’t think we will be relegated with BFS in charge but it will be a struggle. His demeanour recently during and after games has been appalling so who is motivating the team? The fact is that West Ham United will not move forward under BFS. We will not progress to the level we need to be at in the Olympic stadium with BFS as manager. We will not attract the class of player we need with BFS as manager. He must go for the future of the club. If not in January then at the end of the season.
To rvt I take your point but I don’t believe we would have conceded 4 goals against Liverpool with Reid in the team. And definately not the 3 against Norwich.
And Petec I think you underestimate how well allardyce did in the championship. He had to practically build a whole new team with a new way of playing and he did that and got us promoted in a season. When we were in the championship before we only scraped a playoff place and were no where near the automatic places.
An there is a lot of truth to the striker situation but there is nothing that can be done about that at the moment. Changing manager wouldn’t help in any way.
Ultimately big Sam has faults but who is a better option to replace him at this moment in time?
The guy is a clown and you write him up as a let’s not panic or needs another chance. I bet you liked grant too eh. Any number of coaches out there at present so no excuses only if the tight board as rumoured don’t want to pay up his contract is stopping them than here we go again. Never wanted this clown at our club from day one but gave him his chances and his failed big time out now please board asp.
No actually I thought grant was a really bad manager and should have been got rid of earlier in that season. Even allardyces fiercest critic cannot argue he has been as bad as grant