I felt for Andriy Yarmolenko after it was revealed he could be out for six months after coming off injured against Spurs last month and having surgery on a torn Achilles. It looked as though he was finding his feet and getting good game time which always helps when you are a new signing.
As a new player at a new club and environment, you want to try and hit the ground running as you settle in and while he didn’t quite do that, he certainly grew into his role at West Ham and was getting used to life in east London before being injured. He’d impressed me with the influence he was having in games and the goals he was scoring. Had he tucked away that header against Chelsea, that could’ve had a huge impact on our results in October.
Hopefully he won’t be too big a loss for us and that whoever comes in to replace him on a regular basis can come in and do the business but it’s still tough for Andriy. He’s one of a growing list of long-term injuries we have at the moment – how many seasons have we said that now?
All these injuries combined could start to have a negative impact on the pitch and, more importantly, on results. October wasn’t a great month for us after the highs of September. Two defeats against Spurs and a defeat away at Brighton and a draw at Leicester wasn’t ideal at all.
You earmark games to pick up points and I’m sure most of you wanted more from these games than one point and a cup exit. Hopefully November will be more prosperous than October but if we keep playing well and losing, we could find ourselves in trouble.
It’ll be interesting to see who we offload during the transfer window. Some of our higher profile players who aren’t playing might be moved on but the problem could be who wants them? It’s difficult to do business in January unless there is a team desperate for fresh blood.
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