They say all good things come to an end, and they did today as West Ham’s run of being unbeaten in five games ended with defeat to Everton—and just as I was starting to get used to that winning lark.
It wasn’t a very exciting afternoon for either side, and given that the halftime results across the Premier League suggested that the race to be shown last on Match Of The Day was alive and kicking, the slightly lacklustre display from both sides didn’t really stand out. However, there were some positives to be taken from the game; the main one being that Sam Allarydce didn’t headbutt any Everton players (or West Ham players, to the best of my knowledge.)
Here are five things I learned from our game at Everton.
ONE
It boggles my mind why we defend in games as if we’re constantly a man down. Defensively, we weren’t bad today, but our strategy did look more like that of the Chelsea game than that of our recent wins. Of course, this did work until Romelu Lukaku’s goal, and kept a strong side quiet, but it really didn’t make for an attractive afternoon of football.
TWO
The early substitution of Carlton Cole for Andy Carroll was harsh, even if getting Carroll on the pitch was necessary. Carlton Cole was not playing well today, but I would stop short of taking a striker off after a 27-minute period in which we had just 15% possession. It was a tactical decision, but this is likely to be extremely demotivating to Cole—particularly given his decent goal tally of late.
THREE
Possession. [puh-zesh-uh n] noun.
1. The act or fact of possessing.
2. Something West Ham don’t appear to be interested in.
We retained 31% possession today, which must be a new personal best for the club, but yet we don’t seem to push for more. 30% possession saw us do well against Southampton, but it isn’t good enough against Everton, who are a stronger side. I’d love to see us take more risks, and attempt to hold onto the ball for longer. We had a few decent opportunities going forward today, and I’d have liked to see us do more on the attack— we are capable of better.
FOUR
I’m starting to worry that every time someone so much as bumps into Andy Carroll he’ll either be injured or sent off. When he went down and came up limping, I feared the worst. When he dislocated his finger, I worried he’d be out till June. I can’t carry on like this.
FIVE
Whilst we didn’t look as if we could get three points today, I still have some questions about the quality of refereeing I’ve seen this season in the Premier League. How Gareth Barry avoided a card after he appeared to shove Kevin Nolan, I don’t know—and that’s a decision that could have re-defined the game. How Moss thought Tomkins deserved a yellow for a tackle that should have made him Man of the Match, I also don’t know.
Moss seemed to step up a bit in the second half, as did Everton, but as a general rule of thumb, if you’re making Uriah Rennie look good, refereeing top level games is probably not for you.
Overall, it just wasn’t a very good game, was it? There were few heroes and few villains, and all in all it wasn’t an inspiring match. Everton went into the game the favourites, and managed to snatch a 1-0 win. There was a point we could have taken, but with the way we played it would have been unlikely to have gotten all three points.
We did well to hold them off for 80 minutes, and we’re still in tenth place, having lost against a top six side who were 14 points clear of us (now 17.) It’s always disappointing to lose, but it’s not a game to lose any sleep over tonight.
It feels a bit weird to lose, which is something I’d never have thought two months ago. We’re a better side that we used to be, and this result is but a minor setback to a great run in form.
What did you think of the match? Will we bounce back against Stoke? Let us know below or tweet me @makingthemarrow
Yeah, we might bounce up, like to see nocerino on for some future matches. I agree, this year watching some extraordinarily bad ref decisions has been a bit of a put off.
Most annoying thing about the game was toffees were as poor as us and if we’d played a little better we would have definitely got something out of the game! We need someone who will make us push up a bit more. It’s getting a bit worrying now how deep we keep sitting and how easily we keep surrendering ground in midfield. The bad result and enforced layoff until the next game has put extra pressure on us to get a result at stoke. Pressure we have largely created ourselves by such a poor display against the mousers. If we repeat the performance we will get done!