Former West Ham striker Tony Cottee says the fact that a striker has not scored a goal for the Hammers in the first 17 matches of this season is “an absolute joke.”
Writing in his column for the Newham Recorder, Cottee said he would have been anticipating leaving a club if he himself had gone that long without scoring:
“West Ham have played 17 games so far this season and in that time not one striker has hit the net and for me that is an absolute joke. I was a striker and prided myself on scoring goals.”
“I think the longest I went without scoring was 10 games, so if after 17 games, not just me, but all my fellow strikers had failed to hit the net then I would be making a bee-line for the exit door. If you want to work out why we are sitting fourth from bottom in the table, look no further than that statistic. It’s embarrassing to think about.”
Both Andy Carroll and Diafra Sakho are expected to return to the fold after the international break, and will hopefully be able to improve on the performances of both Simone Zaza and Jonathan Calleri who have so far failed to impress since their arrival at the club at the start of the season.
Carroll has been sidelined with a knee injury since August, and Sakho has been suffering from a chronic back complaint which caused him to fail his medical when he was on the verge of a £16million to West Bromwich Albion in the summer.
