Fourteen goals conceded in the last five games is not a good stat. Normally, scoring seven in those five games might have given us more points but it was not to be, with two particularly heavy defeats.
I have to say, watching the Chelsea game was painful and surely one of the worst games I’ve seen us play for a long time. The argument can’t always be that Chelsea are a bigger or better team than us – that’s not the era West Ham are in any more.
What concerned me the most was the reaction of Lopetegui on the sidelines and the subsequent reactions of the players. It looked like no one knew what they were doing. He would wave his arms and shout, the players would change their minds about what they were about to do and then lose the ball. It was woeful.
In fairness then, putting five past us was probably flattering for Liverpool, but that’s another shot at silverware we won’t get this season and it’s a shame. We need to grab those opportunities. So then it was positive to see us get into a good rhythm against Ipswich. Alright, it was ‘only Ipswich’, but results like that are where confidence comes in, players get to know each other a bit more and we can gain a bit of momentum.
It was great to see Antonio, Kudus, Bowen and Paqueta on the scoresheet at the London Stadium that day – all players we need to be relying on to keep the ball going into the back of the net week in, week out. It felt a shame then to see an international break come along. We’ll never know if following a four-goal home win we could have continued to bring that confidence into a big game against Spurs.
It just feels like we could start to come into a consistent run – I hope so, the tables need to turn before the fans get really fed up and the players’ heads drop. The next couple of games are huge – not easily winnable but we have to give it a good go.
When you look at the table, it’s clear that quite a few clubs are struggling at the moment. I bet there are fans of many Premier League teams wondering what’s going wrong. So we’re not in panic mode yet, but it’s not far away if November doesn’t prove to be fruitful.
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