Falling Through The Hull In The Cracks

I've been to Hull, I actually rather liked it with its bevy of Northern birds without Mancunian accents, and I have to say I love going to Yorkshire video shops and renting T'Good, T'Bad, and T'Ugly. Of course I'm wrong with my facts, as my native Hullian uncle will tell thee, but either way Hull was a good laugh, and not too dissimilar from the East End with it's strong roots in the dockyards and industry. I suppose I'm admitting I have a soft spot for Hull, and there's only two games that I've been asking that they don't win...didn't they go and mess that up for me.


Not Much To Say

I can't really bring myself to say too much about this week's game. Over here in the States it was broadcast on Setanta at 10am. I piled on down my local boozer and ordered a nice egg and sausage breakfast. My waitress was pleasant, and had never seen anybody drink enough tea to give themselves heart palpitations after only the first 30 minutes of play - but if she knew more people who support such a frustrating team then this wouldn't have been a first for her. Needless to say my free refills of brew were the biggest plus of this Sunday, and ensured that I stayed up until about 3am as well, relentlessly smacking my head into my bedroom wall hoping that the result that had occurred 15 hours earlier had been some kind of dream, and at some point I would wake up, it would be 9am, and I'd be ready to take my pre-match/breakfast/blog shower.

Anyway, it was not to be, and I didn't wake up in a better, brighter world, but instead I realised I was fully awake in the nightmare that is the life of a West Ham fan. At times West Ham just totally take the piss out of you. A few weeks ago we all sat there bemoaning that Curbs' style of play wasn't the West Ham way; the ball wasn't on the deck, we weren't fluidly knocking it about, and generally our style of play resembled Wimbledon's circa 1743. Sunday though saw a West Ham team, fully energised from Zola's week long lecture on trigonometry, come out and play triangles for about 80 of the 90 minutes of play available. Which would be fine, if you can convert a couple of those diagonal passes into shooting opportunities - which of course we really didn't - compare an 85.5% passing success rate with only 1 shot on target and 8 shots total.

While much of this was due to Hull's deep back line, which really prevented any penetration before the 18 yard box, we must also look at our own ineptitude to produce anything imaginative or clear cut in our whole 90 minutes on the field, or in fact be be able to finish when presented with a semi-decent chance; take Carlton Cole hitting the bar from 5 yards out after beautifully turning a defender (is that possible?), or Matty Etherington hitting the side netting with an open (but slightly tricky) chance, or any of our midfielders looking scared to cross the ball and preferring to knock the ball square. For a second, I actually thought we were Arsenal, always wanting to ignore the obvious choice (ie crossing the ball after skinning a defender by the by-line), for something more frustrating than watching Christian Dailly run the ball out of play for the 2,886,746,987th time.

The fact that Louis Boa Morte seems to have been implanted with a magnet to keep him stuck on the hard cold metal subs benches though is always a victory, and so with an instantly more cheery demeanour let's move on to the player analysis. Please be advised though that all ratings are off of the back of a caffeine induced haze.


Greeny: Claimed well in the air, although not the greatest positioning on the goal allowed. - 6

Faubert: Some decent movement, not as many crosses as normal, and still looks a bit timid at the back letting people get past him a bit too much. - 6

Upson: Didn't get on his man for the goal, wasn't goal-side of him. Apart from that pretty solid. - 5.5

Neill: Obviously jet-lagged after returning from Oz duty as he lost all of his pace and looked unusually slow and sluggish. Just kidding, Neill's cure for avoiding jet-lag is eating his way into a calorie induced coma for those long haul flights ensuring his performances are consistently lacklustre no matter where in the world he is. - 5.5

Um-Bongo: Attack minded again, and even cheekily (though deemed illegally) took the ball from the keeper when he was dropping it to kick and sublimely scissor kicked a lob into the net. He'll be a firm crowd favourite in no time! - 6.5

Defence Overall: Not bad, middle two still look a bit too slow, Faubert still not the fully qualified right back. Illunga however is stamping his mark on left back after another positive performance. Overall still a little shaky at the back, and it will be nice to have some competition for places there after a few more injuries come back - is there any news on that?

Pepperami: Work rate was ok, largely unnoticeable to the caffeinated viewer. - 6

Parker: Not his worst performance by far, but his passing radius didn't break 5 yards. Seems to be opposed to making crop circles like he used to though. - 6

Noble: We need Nobes to be the inventive creator, we desperately need him to play the same way that the press think Fank Wankhard plays with clever passes and crashing runs. He showed some decent glimpses on Sunday but things just didn't want to open up for him. - 6

Etherington: I believe that Zola thinks Matty is West Ham's Gerrard, a player that is magic when not given a defined role. Where the fuck does he play anymore, because I ain't seeing him on the left! That aforementioned chance he missed by the way...on the right hand side of the goal. Matt, your right peg is your weaker one. - 6

Midfield Overall: Good mostly, but no invention or killer edge in the final third. Triangles, triangles, and more triangles.

Cole: Had our best chance when he craftily spun off of a defender in the box and fired so high that the ball struck Jesus in the head. Steady, and as always tried hard, but he's no George Best, except when driving. - 6

Bellamy: I'm happy he started, mainly so that his appearances for West Ham can at least total more than his appearances for Wales whilst he's been at UP, and I don't have to go off on one about that. Bellamy's at his best when the ball is laid in front of him, Hull's back four played too deep for that to really happen, plus he was played between Cole and the midfield. Got involved a lot though, and filled in for Etherington's absencequite a lot. - 6.5

Strikers Overall: Give credit to Hull, they defended well and we had little to go on, especially with a midfield on the day with the attacking edge of a butter knife.

Subs

Sine: Unnoticeable. - 4

Cosine: Unnoticeable. -4

Tangent: Didn't feature.


Even if frustrating to watch, this is what we subscribe to when we become West ham fans. On a different day, that performance would have produced a 6-0 thumping. I mean we kept the ball for large periods of time, looked mostly confident in our ability, and looking at both team's tactics, you would have thought we were at home. Fair play to Zola as well, he went for it, we ended the game with 4 recognised strikers on the pitch looking for an equaliser.



Magic Juande

I'll leave you now in a way that should make you sleep at night much more comfortably even if West Ham are losing...

My friends, Spurs are devastatingly bad, and it's amazing to watch. 2-1 loss to Stoke City with two sendings off. I love it, I love it, I love it. 2 points from 8 games, did we mishear their fans? Did they mean to say they'd be taking the bottom four by storm? If this continues at least until December, then I've already got my Christmas present, thanks Spurs.