Thursday, 18 April 2013

West Ham 2 Manchester United 2


The big question on my mind at the end of Wednesday night's game was should I be disappointed with this result or not? On paper I would take a draw against Manchester United any-day and anybody reading this who didn't see or hear anything about the game until they started to read this would think I was stupid to be upset with a point against the new Premier League champions (well almost). But any West Ham fan that saw that game, is probably asking themselves the same question.

Firstly, the fact that for most of the match we were the superior side is incredibly encouraging. All season we have been incredibly dangerous at home, and we have only lost 4 games at home all season (all to teams in the top 7 of the league). This performance was no different, we looked consistently threatening in attack and pretty solid in defence too. 

Our first goal came just 15 minutes into play, when Mohammed Diame started on one of his classic counter-attacking runs down the centre of the pitch and put a through-ball to Matt Jarvis on the wing who took on and completely bamboozled Rio Ferdinand to put in a cross which was headed across goal by Andy Carroll and finally finished off by Ricardo Vaz Te. A wonderful team goal!

Their first was disappointing from our point of view. Shinji Kagawa went on a speedy and skillful dribble to wrong-foot Winston Reid and pass the ball into the feet of Antonia Valencia who needed only to tap the ball into an open net after being left completely unmarked by Joey O'Brien. As Valencia was making his run, I was screaming at O'Brien to cover him instead of moving to intercept the other attacker running in from the centre, but as Kagawa played the ball through, O'Brien had already committed himself as well as Jussi Jaaskelainen who was left helpless as Valencia could do nothing wrong.

After another spell of West Ham possession early into the second half, which included a disallowed Kevin Nolan goal (that hindsight maybe shouldn't have been as the foul that the referee blew for wasn't actually a foul) and a wonderful reaction save by Jaaskelainen from a Robin Van Persie volley 3 yards out., West Ham took the lead once more after a beautiful back-heel from Vaz Te on the wing finally found Diame who turned from his marker and fired in a wonder strike with his weaker foot for one of our goals of the season.


Unfortunately, it was what came next that really hit home... and hit hard. Kagawa from outside the penalty area, took a shot which deflected off James Collins, onto the post, onto the other post and into the path of Van Persie for him to equalise for United. The painful thing is that Van Persie was quite clearly a yard offside, which the assistant referee did not notice. A famous victory over one of the best club sides in the world was taken away from us by a refereeing howler. Some decisions can cost clubs tens of millions, and lets just hope that that wasn't one of them. 

So, to sum up this really was a game that we could have and should have won. However, there are still some clear positives and negatives to take from this.

Starting with the negatives:

1. Kevin Nolan - If Nolan wasn't captain he wouldn't be in the side, and that's the short and the long of it. Another inconsistent performance from our joint top-scorer hasn't filled any Hammers fans with confidence, and the fact that he hasn't scored at home since November is worrying. A return to form is definitely needed by our skipper or he could be shown the door out of our first team.

2. Mohammed Diame's fitness - Diame has easily been one of our best players this season, and is a strong contender for Hammer of the Year. But it seems like he has to be subbed off in the last 10 minutes of every game or he gets completely worn out. In the Southampton game he was forced to play on due to the injury to James Tomkins and you could clearly see the fatigue affecting him and he simply had no energy left. This is a big issue which really needs to be resolved for next year.

3. Defensive worries - This is mainly focusing on United's first goal in which Valencia was given far too much room and easily put away the equaliser. This was a very uncommon incident for our defence and we can only hope that this can be fixed quickly. Our man-marking on the wings needs improvement.

And the positives:

1. Ricardo Vaz Te - The Portuguese striker enjoyed a very timely return to form with his first goal since October and his return from injury. Vaz Te looked much more confident in this game and looked much happier to take on defenders and even try a shot or two. His running back to defend should also be commended and his defensive work was very intelligent and safe (which is what is always needed from defenders). Hopefully he can continue this run of form and score a few more goals before the season's close.

2. A return for Mark Noble - Last year's Hammer of the year made his first appearance since recovering from an arm injury by coming off the bench to replace Gary O'Neil in the second half. The midfielder looked fit enough and made some very descent passes and tackles, the stuff we've been seeing from him all season. His return is a very important one for our side and will most certainly make our selection committee's job a lot harder.

3. Andy Carroll - Big Andy has looked absolutely unstoppable in his last few games. The centre forward has not only scored 5 goals in 7 games now, but was once again named man of the match for the second home game in a row. Carroll's aerial threat and defensive work has been top class recently and I'm sure almost all West Ham fans will want to seem signed permanently in the summer.

With only 5 games left and a top ten place up for grabs lets hope our team can push on from this draw and grab a few more wins before the season ends.

West Ham: Jaaskelainen, Demel, Collins, Reid, O'Brien, O'Neil (Noble 67), Diame (Taylor 82), Nolan (Collison 82), Vaz Te, Jarvis, Carroll

No comments:

Post a Comment