OPINION
Manuel Pellegrini must permanently axe West Ham defender Angelo Ogbonna after his horror show of a performance against Tottenham on Wednesday.
The centre-back, who earns £70,000-a-week (Source: Spotrac), was handed a rare opportunity to impress during the 1-0 defeat to Spurs in the EFL Cup and all he did was show why he didn’t regularly feature for the first-team.
It may have been Halloween but there was no need for Ogbonna to put in such a bad performance in order to scare Hammers fans every time Tottenham went close to their side’s goal.
The 30-year-old centre-back never looked comfortable, was often left scrambling and just generally didn’t look up to dealing with players charging at him.
Also Ogbonna showed how much of a liability he could be during Son Heung-min’s goal for Spurs as he had enough time to clear the ball, but made such a mess of the whole situation instead that his opposition were able to punish the Hammers.
If this was the first time the defender didn’t look good enough for the Hammers, it would simply be able to be forgotten about and classed as a bad day at the office.
However in the other four outings he made this season, Ogbonna has looked terrible and has shown no signs that any sort of good form is about to be showcased by him.
While the 30-year-old was the best of a bad bunch, if you ignore Pablo Zabaleta, last season it’s clear that he simply isn’t up to playing under Pellegrini as for whatever reason, he has struggled beyond imagination.
Given that the Hammers are not out of the EFL Cup and will want to take the FA Cup seriously when it starts for them as well as not drop points carelessly in the Premier League, Ogbonna should not feature again unless there’s a drastic change of events such as an unpredictable injury crisis.
The defender has had more than enough chances to prove his worth and after his horror show against Spurs, Pellegrini must drop him.
