OPINION
West Ham’s season has been something of a roller-coaster so far and Saturday’s defeat to Everton was another low in a series of disappointments in east London.
To say that the Hammers were some way off the pace in their’s 2-0 loss to the Toffees would be a gross understatement – Manuel Pellegrini’s men were beaten with ease and it could, and perhaps should, have been more for Marco Silva and his men.
It was quite alarming how easy it was for the visitors to seal victory and there will not have been one happy individual of a West Ham persuasion on Saturday evening.
One man who made his frustrations crystal clear was senior star Pablo Zabaleta, the Argentine veteran launching a damning indictment of his teammates’ lack of mental strength.
He told the London Evening Standard: “I am not happy at all because if you look at the season so far, we have not been consistent enough. We have had three or four bad performances against teams around us. There are five teams looking for that seventh position and it is all about one or two points difference between them.
“We have lost so many opportunities to be in that seventh place and it shows the weak mentality that we have probably got and which we need to improve looking forward.”
The former Manchester City man is not wrong – the Irons have been woefully inconsistent this season – but the blame for that lies solely at Pellegrini’s door.
It is the manager’s responsibility not only to provide the tactics which they hope will result in victory – something which has not always been the case with the Chilean – but also to ensure his players are mentally in the right place to secure the three points.
West Ham’s players have not been there, Zabaleta making that evident with his verdict, and while the finger can be pointed the way of the dressing room, it is the man in the dugout who has to take responsibility.
