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Really tough start to the upcoming season. Come on you Irons!

Around 2.40 for musical gold.

From KUMB.

http://kumb.com/story.php?id=124776

Or was it just his weight? From the Independent today:

‘The best new chant of the World Cup concerns West Ham’s Benni McCarthy, South Africa’s star player who has been controversially left out the squad because he is – to put it bluntly – just too fat.

A sometime musician, McCarthy had a hit with Shibobo (which translates as the football term for a nutmeg) with the band TKZee, the key lyric of which was “Benni’s in the area”, a play on his goalscoring prowess. Having seen him in their national team’s new tight-fitting jersey that has been changed by the South African fans to “Benni’s in the cafeteria”.’

Either way, Benni was our biggest January signing at a time when our season was desperately lacking goals and quality. What a joker.

West ham have today confirmed the signing of Thomas ‘der hammer’ Hitzlsperger on a three year deal. The former Aston Villa man has become Avram Grant’s first signing as manager and returns to the Premier League after spells with Stuttgart and Lazio. During his time at Stuttgart he played an important role in their 06/07 season, contributing seven goals as the side won the Bundesliga and he was later made team captain. The midfielder joined Lazio during the January transfer window to bolster his prospects of making Germany’s World Cup squad but narrowly missed out. He is known for having a powerful left shot from range.

A statement on the club website has claimed that the arrival of an experienced international player with over 60 caps for his national side is close to signing. After checking the ever reliable Wikipedia Hitzlsperger misses this mark by nine caps. So perhaps another new recruit is imminent. Yossi maybe?

We will never surrender!

Earlier today the former Portsmouth boss, Avram Grant was officially appointed as the new West Ham manager on a four year contract. Grant was the clear favourite to succeed Zola after the Italian’s departure last month. Difficult to know how to react to this as the distasteful sacking of Zola for breach of contract still rankles. Even mild mannered Sir Trevor pleaded for greater clarity from the co-chairmen. We have certainly had a clearer narrative from Gold and Sullivan of late as they stressed the importance of recruiting a manager who had ‘been there, done it and got the T-shirt.’

Grant was quoted on the club website today saying, “I am proud and honoured to be the manager of West Ham. It is an exciting challenge and I am ready to do my best.” He additionally said the usual waffle about passionate fans and a rich history. Questions have been asked on other blogs and fan sites as to whether Grant has the charisma and personality to connect with the West Ham faithful. David Gold thinks so and I for once agree with him. He was perceived as a rather dour individual whilst at Chelsea but he became more animated during his short reign at Pompey, rallying the players and the fans in the face of financial meltdown.

It will be interesting to have a boss who has managed at both ends of the Premier League and perhaps that wealth of experience which Gold alluded to will win him the confidence of the players. With the sad departure of Franco and Ilan together with poor displays at the back last season, defence and attack will be the key areas for improvement. I just hope therefore that Grant’s first move in the transfer market is not to go after the likes of O’Hara and Boateng.

After just short of two years in charge of our club, Gianfranco Zola was today dismissed as West Ham United manager. His sacking was expected but was no less disappointing and regrettable for that. The club statement was extremely concise, thanking him for his efforts and stressing that every effort would now be made to find a new appointment. Zola was the most amiable of football managers and perhaps his persona did help him through some of the bad times and win the support of the majority of Hammers fans. The number crunchers may point to our win percentage being just below 30% during his tenure but I will remember some of the beautiful football we played under him. He enjoyed a very promising start to his managerial career but then went a long time without a win. It was during the second half of last season that he really came into his own. The away win at Wigan will always stick in my mind, as we went ahead through a delightful team goal finished off by Cole and we also showed plenty of grit and composure to keep a clean sheet. This was to be a feature of our play as we pushed for a potential Europa league spot.

We all know that this season did not follow that script as we were dogged in particular by poor defending and only managed one away win all season. Nevertheless I think there was widespread empathy and understanding of these results given the perilous financial state of the club and lack of investment in the squad. The arrival of Gold and Sullivan brought a degree of enthusiasm and relief but their comments since acquiring a 50% stake in the club consistently undermined Zola. They spoke all too frequently about the terrifying spectre of relegation and publicly pondered whether Zola was too nice to succeed in management. There was also dramatic criticism of the players, the launch of a complaint against Fulham and an attempt to sign a player both without the knowledge of Zola. It was quite clear that they were seeking to push him out despite saying that staying up was all they could ask of him come the season finale. Of course there are a few legitimate criticisms that can be made of Zola this season including his decision to play Diamanti on the left of midfield and the all too frequent changes at the back which often backfired. That said I think many a fan would have welcomed Zola being given another chance with some cash to spend. The money spent on sacking Zola and recruiting a new manager could have been added to the transfer kitty. Too early to speculate on who the best candidate is to replace Zola but let’s hope our chairman can find someone who has their confidence so we can be spared their clumsy comments to the media.

Thank you Gianfranco for not walking after the Stoke defeat and rousing the players who must have been demoralised to get a vital point at Everton which spurred us on to crucial home wins against Sunderland and Wigan. If only our owners had an ounce of your dignity, honesty and humility.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/may/11/gianfranco-zola-west-ham-manager

I wanted him to have a bit of cash to spend his way and another season. Gutted. Who on earth will take this job?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/w/west_ham_utd/8671098.stm

Man City have nothing to play for. With the last game of the season being the potential last game for the management, for a fair few players and the last chance for our England hopefuls to impress, I’m predicting a win. Barry’s injury has had a lot of people talking about a call-up for Scott Parker. He was quiet against Fulham last weekend, but I expect him to own the midfield today. An England spot would cap another incredible season for our ‘captain’.

Daprela, Boa Morte and Diamanti starting… We’re going to murder them!

The Hammers weren’t able to capitalise on Fulham resting seven, that’s right Sullivan, seven of their European heroes in a game that did nothing much to suggest West Ham deserve any better than a seventeenth place league finish.

After a very slow start to the game, West Ham began to control possession and had a couple of cracking efforts through Noble and Da Costa. With a sublime touch to take the ball past the Fulham defender on the edge of the 18 yard, Noble fired a low curler that Schwarzer pushed past his left post. Da Costa must have got bored chipping speculative balls towards Carlton Cole and instead he thumped a 40 yard rocket heading directly for the top left corner. Sadly not enough movement on the ball though and Schwarzer had no trouble tipping it over. So far so good. Fulham had hit the bar through Dempsey and they did seem to be causing Spector a bit of trouble down the right, but with half time round the corner and the chance to make a couple of all out attacking changes, the game remained for the taking. That is until Fulham played a neat move on the left that tore apart our defence and left Dempsey free to strike a cool finish low to Green’s right. Incredibly frustrating given the timing of the goal and the ease with which Fulham ran rings round our midfield and defence. Their goal amounted to about ten second’s worth of decisive attacking play, a simple change of tempo and we were taken apart.

Sadly the second half brought no immediate changes. Cole had been ineffectual in the 1st half, but a Franco-Ilan partnership is perhaps seen as too weak to lead the line. No sight of birthday boy Diamanti, no Daprela and no LBM. I know it was only half time, but in a game that amounts to little more than a friendly for Fulham and an exercise in pride for the Irons, why not make a couple of half time changes? Noble started the 2nd half fired up and the little that we created came through him. Sadly a cruel deflection put Fulham two up, but the all to familiar inability to deal with set pieces had played a part. We were given a glimmer of hope through Cole’s flick from a good set piece from Noble, but despite Diamanti and Franco’s introduction, we simply didn’t mount an attacking threat. Again speculative chipped balls towards Cole were the only tactic. Fulham got their third through a mistake from Spector, Riise robbing him whilst the American attempted a clearance and his ball across the six yard box finding an unmarked Okaka who smashed the ball past Green. The consolation goal was really well worked, an indication of what the team can achieve when they use the width of the pitch and keep the ball on the deck. A nice bit of interplay from Parker and Noble on the left saw Noble free to burst towards the box, Parker had continued his run, Noble duly played it through to him and Parker’s subsequent pull-back found Franco who finished the move off with a controlled finish. A nice move, but the game was already dead and buried.

A win would have put us in fourteenth place and given the fans something to smile about before the inevitable Sullivan led media circus that will accompany the ‘restructuring’ in the summer. Problem is we didn’t deserve anything from the game. The limitations of playing with four central midfielders are painfully clear, as is our lack of pace going forward. Conceding three to a below par Fulham has to go down as a defensive disaster and for me the blame will always lie with Upson (Spector is too easy a target!) as he is supposedly our captain and allegedly good enough to play for England. His decision making yesterday was poor throughout the game. He and Green should be commanding our back-line, but we are way too fragile. When the wholesale changes arrive, it is unquestionably the defence that needs the biggest shake up.

Ironworks man of the match - Mark Noble.

Goal of the season?

What a week its been in terms of transfer gossip and internal wranglings at West Ham United. After the dramatic win at home to Wigan last Saturday and Gold’s suggestion that Zola deserved another chance next season there was a new feeling of optimism. However as it had been a while since we had heard from David Sullivan, this image of harmony was not to last long.

The PFA Fans’ Player of the Year in the Championship, Graham Dorrans, was the subject of a written bid from West Ham in the region of 4 million pounds. This does indicate that the club has some cash despite the presumably ongoing debt troubles. Moreover Dorrans appears to be an exciting, young midfielder who could still reach twenty goals this season. This news was tempered by Sullivan’s comment that Zola was not interested whatsoever in player transfers. This raised the unnerving picture of Sullivan, Gold and Brady thrashing out potential transfer targets. Sullivan went on to say that every player is up for sale this summer, at the right price, apart from Scott ‘Mr West Ham’ Parker. Our tactful and diplomatic Co-Chairman was at it again when he was quoted as saying that Zola could well leave at the end of the season. Once again Gold has proved to be the more thoughtful and considered of the two as he tried to put Sullivan’s comments into some context. He attempted to reassure fans that despite Sullivan’s evident hyperbole the club would strive to keep their best players and reinforce the squad.

Zola indicated in his press conference the other day that he has enjoyed a closer relationship with David Gold who he said had always been supportive to himself and the players. But during an insightful pre-match press conference the Italian made no attempt to conceal his displeasure at the events of this week. He said the comments surrounding players being for sale was unpleasant and argued that other key players in the squad would not be best pleased at Sullivan’s populist move to cite one player as being beyond reproach. He also said he would not have known how to react if the bid for Dorrans had been successful as he only knew of the decision when it reached the press. “I have been surprised so many times this year – so I am not surprised that I am surprised.” From these comments it is difficult not to conclude that Sullivan in particular has systematically tried to exclude Zola from club business and undermine his position as manager. It now looks increasingly unlikely that our amiable manager will not be in charge next season. But the shambolic (to coin a phrase from Sullivan) way in which the club is being run will make it hard to attract any decent, self respecting managers.

I’m off to Fulham tomorrow and if we can get a win there full credit will go to Gianfranco who must be questioning the point of geeing up the players for these final two games with all the nonsense going on behind the scenes.