West Ham U.S.A.

West Ham v Aston Villa Saturday at 10 am on Fox Soccer Plus

2011-04-15T19:33:00.000-04:00

We're going low-def this weekend (in my house, anyway) for the match that will make or break our season. It'll be on Fox Soccer Plus at 10 am, with stomach-churning live coverage. I, uh, can't wait. Or maybe I can. In any case, it's going to happen.

Beat Villa, and we live to fight another day. Draw, and we're likely looking at opening against Scunthorpe or Doncaster (or Millwall...?) next season. Lose, and it's lights out and a trip straight to the npower (whatever that is) Championship. Overly dramatic? Maybe, but Villa can bury is with a win on Saturday, and Blackpool--our most serious survival opponent at this point--have a fairly weak run-in with Wigan at home this weekend and something like for of their last six games on the seacoast. (That's where Blackpool is, the seacoast.)

Oh, and we'll be doing it all tomorrow without Scott Parker, who, according to my new Android West Ham phone app (provided by FootyFocus--look for it), has an Achilles problem and won't be playing. That's right. Relegation six-pointer, do or die...and no Scott Parker. I don't even have words here. I also have no words for Bolton. Three goals conceded and not even a card to show for our troubles? Did we even send a squad, or did Bolton play XI-on-zero, still keeping 10 men behind the ball and only attacking on the counter (hence the paltry three goals)? It wasn't on TV, so I'm not sure...

Gird your loins, Irons fans. Tomorrow, the entire future of our club hangs in the balance, and our field general will be watching from the Recaro seats. Other than that, it should be an enjoyable Saturday of football...

COYI

No TV for Bolton v West Ham?

2011-04-07T00:11:00.000-04:00

What's this? You mean to tell me that Bolton, the most stupefyingly boring team in English football, isn't a big TV draw? Pretty much every other Premier League fixture seems to be on US TV this weekend, but I can't find Bolton v West Ham anywhere. So, I guess it's Foxsoccer.tv, some stream or the ignominy of a Soccernet "game tracker" for fans of the Claret and Blue this weekend. Hooray.

I don't want to talk about what happened against Manchester United. Yes, I know that this blog is here pretty much solely so that I (and you, the faithful reader) can talk about that sort of thing, but I don't want to talk about it. The whole thing was just such a complete mess. Plus, I hate Wayne Rooney, and I hated him even before he buried us in the second half last weekend. So, let's move on to...Bolton?

Ugh, Bolton. What a horrible excuse for a football club. Park-the-bus, clatter-and-run claptrap. It's the antithesis of what West Ham stand for (or should), and yet Bolton never seem too bothered by the threat of relegation, whereas we constantly seem to be fighting to stay up. Well, I'd rather watch us go down fighting with some modicum of style than watch us float to safety by playing Bolton's stultifying football version of the 1990s New Jersey Devils' neutral-zone trap. (Sorry, I've been watching a lot of hockey lately.) I think I mean that. Just don't ask me if I do should we actually go down this season. Right now, I'm standing on my football principles, but in a way I'm secretly glad that I might not have to watch the match this Saturday. Freaking Bolton.

COYI

Two Weeks of Safety

2011-03-20T11:30:00.000-04:00

Let's get the niggling little matters out of the way first. Carlton Cole, go around the keeper next time. In fact, learn to finish a chance here and there and you'll be a top striker. As it stands, you get up and down the pitch well; you play surprisingly effectively in your own end, and you set yourself up to score fairly often...but you can't finish.

If you could, we might have nicked three points yesterday. A striker has to be able to finish. It's that simple. You'll be back in the Recaro seats once Robbie Keane, Frederic Piquionne and Victor Obinna are available for the starting XI because they put the ball in the net while you hold your head in your hands. Oh, and Gary O'Neil--you still just don't impress me much. You're better than what we were throwing out there before January, but you were largely anonymous yesterday, which you tend to be most of the time.

Right, with that settled, let's talk about what went right yesterday: pretty much everything else. Aside from Cole's wastefulness--and, to his credit, he did do well to at least set himself up to score--yesterday's 0-0 draw with Spurs in sparkling HD on ESPN2 was a Premiership performance. What I mean by that is that it was pragmatic, spirited and effective. The collective effort was immense. We stole a point in a match we probably should have lost, and we weren't far from stealing all three. That's what Premiership clubs do, and with more football like the kind we played yesterday, we'll be Premiership club again next season.

We turned in way too many Championship performances prior to our recent run of success--total capitulations in which we looked disorganized, disinterested and downright beaten. I wrongly blamed Avram Grant for most of those performances; it seems pretty clear now that with a decent squad, Grant is at least a decent manager. He might even be a good one. Tactically and in terms of player selection, he got yesterday right and should take credit for his wise management and cool head.

It wasn't very West Ham of me to suggest on multiple occasions earlier in the season that Grant had to go. We've never been a club that hires and fires managers in rapid succession, and we shouldn't become one. Should we stay up this season and continue to perform as we have since the second half at West Brom, there's no reason why Grant shouldn't return for next season and many reasons why he should.

Of course, with Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City--not to mention the dreadful prospect of Bolton--all on the docket, survival is far from guaranteed. As it stands, though, we're safe for two weeks (although just barely) given next weekend's Euro 2012 qualifiers. As April begins and the pressure really mounts, we'll take on the league leaders, Man U, at home. Three points separate 13th from 20th.

Given how we've played against Spurs this season, though, who's to say that we can't steal at least a point from Man U as well? Yesterday's match was a real rarity, a thrilling goalless draw. Yes, Tottenham wasted some chances. Sure, we left a lot of open pitch in the midfield. But when Spurs got into our final third, we closed ranks with stunning effectiveness. Scott Parker and Mark Noble bot played defensive gems, and Noble nearly stole a goal with a skillful overhead kick. Thomas Hitzlsperger didn't have much going forward, but he tracked back well to clear dangerous situations. Parker was exhausted with about 15 minutes left to play but didn't leave the pitch--it appears as though Grant has fallen into the Gianfranco Zola trap of leaving our talisman on for too long, even when he's clearly wiped.

No matter, though. Even as Super Scotty's battery wore down, our back line remained superb. Somebody get Manuel Da Costa a good lawyer (hopefully he's just plain innocent) because he was immense yesterday, flying all over the pitch and just getting a foot in here and there to break up several Tottenham chances. Matthew Upson was also very good once again, and Wayne Bridge and particularly Lars Jacobsen locked down Spurs' wide game and frustrated Gareth Bale and Jermain Defoe for most of the afternoon.

And then there was Rob Green. I've long swum against the West Ham tide when it comes to our keeper, criticizing him more than praising him. But he was man of the match yesterday without question, and we probably go down 2-0 on the day if he doesn't make a couple of magnificent saves. His tip against the bar of Bale's free kick five minutes from time was easily one of our plays of the season and might end up being the difference between going down and staying up once all the points and goals are tallied. Keeping a clean sheet was of paramount importance for us not only because it snatched us a point but also because goal differential is likely to play a factor in this season's relegation battle.

Let's not forget that Spurs, for all their relative struggles in the league this season, are in the quarter-finals of the Champions League and just ousted one of the biggest clubs in Europe from that competition. Spurs can beat Milan, but they can't beat us--taking four points off of Tottenham in 2010-2011 and battling to a draw in front of a frustrated crowd at White Hart Lane was satisfying to say the very least. As loathe as we might be to admit it, Spurs are a bit club now. They have big-club money, and they're starting to get big-club results at home and abroad. Taking four of six off of them is a huge accomplishment, derby satisfaction aside.

And it should give us hope for the run-in. Clearly, Tottenham struggle in the league after playing in Europe; their domestic results this season show that. While Manchester United and Chelsea are less likely to fall into such a two-competition trap, it's entirely possibly that we'll get a tired, listless Man U side on April 2 with it's mind elsewhere. Sure, that's not exactly what Alex Ferguson's sides are known for, but Manchester United will be the hunter and West Ham the wounded animal in this situation. They'll have the weapons, but we'll have the basic need to survive on our side. That will make us the dangerous team. We'll be fighting for our lives, and there's not much greater motivation than that.

Add to all that our recent form, which is frankly superb save for one FA Cup match ruined by an incompetent referee, and I'm personally feeling very confident about our chances for survival and maybe even for finishing above 17th. Form is temporary, as always, and disaster lurks around every corner with West Ham, also as always. But we're on the up while clubs like Blackpool, Birmingham and Aston Villa are starting to struggle big time. In fact, there's a pretty good possibility that the city of Birmingham won't be represented in the Premiership at all next season, although I personally see Wigan and Blackpool (their ride is just about over) going down with a third club to be determined. At this point, I'm feeling good about West Ham not being that third club. And for the next couple of weeks, anyway, I'm going to enjoy safety, even if it is still more than a little precarious.

COYI

ESPN2 for Tottenham v West Ham

2011-03-18T14:41:00.001-04:00

Not being a morning person, I'm going to DVR this one. The good news is that our critical crunch at White Hart Lane will be live on TV here in the US. The bad news is that it's an 8:45 am EDT broadcast. (Folks on the West Coast, you might as well not even go to bed the night before.)

Back to good news, though--the game will be on ESPN2, which means high-quality HD (as opposed to FSC's fuzzier stuff). Do set your DVRs, though, as ESPN2 doesn't rerun matches throughout the week the way the Fox channels do. Miss this one, and you've probably just plain missed it, although I suppose ESPN3.com might have it available online for a while afterward.

How sweet would six points from Tottenham be this season, particularly with the detestable 'Arry Redknapp still in charge there? Spurs are chasing Champions League glory and will soon meet Real Madrid in that vaunted competition, so hopefully they'll be more worried about that than they will be about us. (In all seriousness, they're not going to win the league this season, so maybe we'll face a weakened side on Saturday--although I doubt it.) Of course, this game isn't just about beating Tottenham; it's about staying up. Robbie Keane, unleash your fury on your former club if you're in the starting XI (or not, as apparently you're still a loanee and can't play against your parent club--thanks for the tip, PW).

There seems to be an inordinate number of Spurs "supporters" here in the US and particularly here in Boston. Their numbers aren't as great as those of the Arsenal fakers or the Man U or Liverpool frauds, but that stupid chicken standing on the basketball keeps popping up around town. I really don't know why that is (and it seems to have little or nothing to do with ethnicity...), but in any case they tend to be just as intolerable as the home-grown English Spurs fans are. (Of course, no Spurs "fan" I've met here has yet been able to produce a Spurs membership card when I whip out my West Ham card to prove that I'm actually a member of the club. Funny that. And relatively few have even been to London.) I'd really love to be able to shove six points in the faces of the Spurs crowd next time I'm in the pub, so COME ON YOU IRONS! This one is personal, even for me.

COYI

West Ham Shirts Half Off--Time to Worry?

2011-03-16T00:34:00.000-04:00

I don't even want to get into the travesty that was the FA Cup loss to Stoke. Yeah, sure, we didn't play well in the first half, and Stoke took the match to us at times. But the referee was incompetent almost to the point of comedy, and if you search this site you'll find that it's very, very rare that I even mention the ref in a match. Let's just move on. We probably weren't going to win the Cup, anyway, to be perfectly frank.

The bad thing about a cup loss is that once it's over, it's over. But that's the good thing about it, too. Move on, forget about it. Concentrate on the league. Stay up. That's all we have left to do now. Hopefully our loss to Stoke--which I'd gladly trade for a spot in the Premiership next season--hasn't stopped the momentum we've been building since the fightback at West Brom. We pummeled Stoke in the match that really mattered, the 3-0 win at home.

And we will need momentum. Oh, yes we will. Tottenham, Manchester United, Bolton, Aston Villa, Chelsea and Manchester City all await--in that order. And we must record--what?--at least six points from those six games. That would get us to 37 points and leave us with three more matches to get to the magical number 40, which wasn't so magical last time we went down and might not be this season, either. But there's a logjam from Stoke in 12th all the way down to Wolves in 19th, and it's hard to say right now how many wins we'll need to break it. Oddly enough, we could conceivably finish 9th, but 17th would be fine.

One win over a Tottenham or a Man U would be absolutely massive, obviously, and would send a message to the rest of the league that we're not npower material yet. As far as messages go, though, I got what I consider something of an ominous one this week. The West Ham Online Megastore e-mailed me (along with everybody else who gets those e-mails) to say that replica shirts are now half-off. What's bad about that? Well, aside from the fact that it'll probably end up costing me money, there's a feeling that the club is giving up somehow.

Replica shirts usually go on sale at the end of the season, and we're not anywhere near the end of the season right now. Somehow, half off after our FA Cup loss has the feel of the club desperately wanting to unload shirts before we go down. Maybe I lived in France for too long, but this feels like some sort of surrender. It's nothing, I know--rationally, anyway. We're still very much in this fight. I'd just feel more comfortable if the club started discounting shirts because the season is ending (and we're safe) and the shirts will be obsolete by the fall. That's not the case right now. It's just too early. Forgive me for freaking out, but I'm a West Ham supporter. You know how it goes.

COYI

West Ham 3-0 Stoke: Life Begins at 29

2011-03-07T14:07:00.000-05:00

Read it and stop weeping. For the first time all season, or at least since I can remember, we're out of the relegation zone on a semi-permanent basis. Game 29 was the springboard, and in in a 3-0 win over Stoke we looked good enough to beat anybody in the Premier League, at least in East London.

I say semi-permanent because Birmingham, which dove into the red lines in table this weekend, still have two games in hand on us. This survival fight isn't just about West Ham and Birmingham, though. It now engulfs nearly the entire bottom half of the table, with Stoke in 12th only three points clear of us in 17th.

And speaking of Stoke...whether they gave us their best effort or not last Saturday is irrelevant. We were not going to lose. We were unbeatable. I don't care if I slip into hyperbole here because that performance was our best of the season, including the 1-0 win over Tottenham and the 3-1 win over Liverpool. Whistle to whistle, for 90 minutes, we dominated Stoke. We could have put two or three more in with an extra dip or curve of the ball here or there.

Our 4-3-3 is on fire. Carlton Cole and Frederic Piquionne were very good up front teaming with the superb Demba Ba, who chased every ball he came near on Saturday and earned his reward with a goal that was much more difficult than it looked. His passing was also pinpoint excellent. Ba and Thomas Hitzlsperger are looking like the saviors of a side that badly needed to shed some dead weight after a horrendous first half of the season.

Hitz, of course, roofed a tremendous insurance goal late, and even Manuel Da Costa, so up and down throughout his West Ham career, managed to score on an excellent header and generally played very well. In fact, the back line of Da Costa, Wayne Bridge, Matthew Upson and James Tomkins (arguably the weakest link of the four, although he was more than adequate on Saturday) was arguably the best we've put on the pitch all season. Even the absence of the always excellent Lars Jacobsen didn't derail a fine defensive effort.

And then there was that midfield. Living legend Scotty Parker, West Ham homeboy Mark Noble and der Hammer aus Deutschland absolutely dominated a Stoke side that desperately needed points and threw everything they had at us. Parker was again stupendous, despite a nagging shoulder injury that obviously bothered him, particularly after he crashed hard into the advertising boards. He is the Claret and Blue Pele, a talisman who has found a home in East London and a budding West Ham legend. Long may he wear our colors.

As tremendous as Saturday was, though, there are, of course, little niggling issues surround West Ham as always. First and foremost, there's our brutal run-in, which includes away matches to Tottenham, Chelsea and Manchester City and a home tussle against Manchester United. Then there's our away form, which remains questionable at best. As solid as our 4-3-3 looks at home, will we be able to use it on the road? And will it continue to click? With the matches we have upcoming, that is a massive question mark still hanging over our season.

Then there's the FA Cup. We take on Stoke (again) on Sunday, and Avram: We must field a weakened side. Look, I love the FA Cup and I know how long it's been since we've won a trophy. But we need every arrow in our quiver if we want to stay up this season, and we must stay up. We're finally healthy, for the most part (knock on wood); we'll go into Tottenham with Victor Obinna, Robbie Keane, Ba, Cole and Piq among our choices of forwards.

That is immense. I don't want to see any of them against Stoke this weekend, honestly. We will, I know, but I'd gladly trade an FA Cup exit for survival. Dig up Freddy Sears, Zavon Hines and Benni McCarthy, if they're healthy. Unearth Gabbidon, Boa Morte, Kovac, Ilunga, Faubert, Barrera...anybody who's still on our roster and healthy but who has been relegated to the Recaro seats of late. And give Johnny Specs a run out, too. We might actually need him for the run in.

More importantly, let's let our tired players rest and heal and come back on March 19 ready to drop the hammer(s) on Tottenham. We've got a real Premiership side now, one that really does look capable of competing with any club in the competition. We'll probably drop points to somebody we should beat, but I'm also very confident right now that we can take three points from at least one of Tottenham, Chelsea, Man U and City--and maybe from more than one of them. But we don't need the distraction of the FA Cup.

Look what we've done since we crashed out of the Carling Cup. Outside of an awful loss to Birmingham at home (which could still prove costly) and that dreadful first half at West Brom, we've been downright unbeatable. Sure, the main catalysts to our success have been the additions of actual Premiership players to the squad and the time they've had to work together, but it hasn't hurt, in my view, for us to concentrate on the league rather than chasing a cup. (Conversely, look at Birmingham's recent league form.)

Avram Grant loves Cup competitions, and that's fine...usually. But this season, we have to be all about the points. After 29 games, we're not only off the bottom of the table but out of the drop zone. Now is the time to solidify ourselves and keep our league momentum going. We can do this. Watch the Stoke match again. We're not dead-certain relegation fodder anymore. We're alive.

COYI

Feeling Stronger Every Day

2011-02-27T21:58:00.000-05:00

I have been a living metaphor for West Ham United lately, so I'm going to lean toward the positive and set the mood for this post with an old Chicago tune that I think and hope describes both me and the club. (Man, that band had some tight brass. I just love it. Also, yes, I said brass.)

So, I got sick. Not (just) sick of West Ham, but actually sick--sinus infection, ear infection, laryngitis, fever, vice-grip headaches, that sort of thing. I was sick for quite a while, close to a month. And since I write for a living and just finishing what I had to do for work over the last few weeks nearly killed me, I haven't even logged on here for weeks. It was nothing personal--I just didn't have it in me.

But now I'm back...and, although I have no idea how, so are West Ham. After the compete debacle at West Brom--yes, the fightback from 3-0 down was nice, but why were we 3-0 down in a relegation six-pointer to begin with?--the Hammers have been on fire, as you well know. The 5-1 FA Cup win over Burnley gave us a taste of what we've been missing with the absence of Thomas Hitzlsperger, and today's victory over Liverpool at the Boleyn (broadcast in glorious HD on Fox Soccer Channel) was simply divine.

In my time away from the blog, I spent a lot of time wondering what had gone wrong so far this season for West Ham. I finally had to admit what no fan wants to realize: Our players might have been the problem. I'm still no particular fan of Avram Grant, but his enthusiasm of late has signaled that he actually cares about his job, even after the club's owners very publicly tried to oust him and failed.

To Grant's credit, we've managed to build a side that looks relatively little like the one that capitulated at Villa to start the season. It's not surprising that we look better now than we did before the January window opened. Hitz is everything we thought he could be now that he's healthy. Wayne Bridge has settled well and is useful, if not fantastic.

Gary O'Neil isn't the fastest player on the pitch but provided good service for Demba Ba's goal against Liverpool. Ba himself has been magnificent. Robbie Keane will be a welcome addition when he returns. Lars Jacobsen continues to be superb; Jonathan Spector looks very good (and even earned a "U-S-A" chant on Saturday) now that he's finally playing at his natural position, and Scotty Parker is Scotty Parker.

Even Carlton Cole, playing in the role of super sub today, looks potent, and he's finally using his big frame to muscle defenders off the ball and create chances in the area. Just look at what he did today in scoring our third goal--he looked like Earl Campbell shaking of a tackler in the Astrodome in 1979. He's a beast when he wants to be; maybe he's just not a 90-minute player. Whatever he's doing, though, it's working.

Perhaps what's more important to look at, though, is who isn't on the pitch. Our new arrivals and a few old faces have started to click together, but they've also kept some notorious slackers and under-performers planted in those fancy claret-and-blue Recaro seats on the non-competitive side of the touchline. That might be helping us more than anything else--the old principle of addition by subtraction.

Luis Boa Morte, who got a lot of playing time earlier this season, is becoming a stranger. Julien Faubert is as long-forgotten as France's last great military victory. We no longer have Pablo Barrera stumbling around in the midfield on a regular basis, and Radoslav Kovac's golden hair is doing little more than reflecting the beams that shine down from the stadium floodlights.

Wayward hero Herita Ilunga and likely cheeseburger aficionado Benni McCarthy no longer look like constant threats to take the pitch, and little Freddie Sears, despite his goal v Burnley, isn't our sadly lacking savior in waiting anymore at the end of a match when we need a goal. Fewer mediocre to poor players on the pitch means fewer mistakes, more consistent possession (something we excelled at today), fewer stupid goals conceded and more chances created. Better players equals better football. Who knew?

The most important thing about the win over Liverpool is that it's the kind of game we're going to need to win if we're going to stay up. We've squandered too many chances against the Birminghams and West Broms and Wolves (Wolveses?) of the world to count on those "easy" games for picking up points. We're going to have to do things the West Ham way now, the tough, nearly impossible way. We'll need to beat Stoke in an NHL-style home-and-home over the next week if we want to escape the relegation zone and move on in the FA Cup.

Then, it's away to Tottenham, home to title-chasing (as usual) Manchester United, away to bogey club Bolton, home to Villa, away to Chelsea... Well, you get the idea. Our opportunities to rack up points against our fellow relegation strugglers are just about gone. But we can do this. Yes, West Ham, with six wins this season, are still alive and very well in the race for survival. Maybe we need big matches; we've slain both Tottenham and Liverpool at home this season, and we're usually good for a famous road win or two every season.

There are issues to address, to be sure. Our back line is still a hodgepodge, and James Tomkins got a bit of a runaround on Liverpool's goal today. More than anything, we need to play the rest of the season the way we played today, with passion, commitment, determination and maximum effort from everybody on the pitch. Finally, we might just have the players in place to do that. We've got 10 games left to play, more than a quarter of the season. We're one step away from climbing out of the relegation basement. We're starting to play West Ham football. We have, I hope, cured what ails us. Right now, anyway, we are feeling stronger every day.

COYI

No TV for West Brom v West Ham

2011-02-11T23:54:00.001-05:00

I am alive. I am as West Ham as I have ever been. I just haven't been able to write about the Birmingham debacle. All the hope I allowed myself to feel after Blackpool just drained out of me when we went down 0-1 at home. It hasn't come back.

I've gone from clinging to shreds of hope to preparing to watch us play Scunthorpe in the Championship on Fox Soccer Plus next season. No, I haven't given up. I'm just trying to live in reality. Like many of you, I live and die with every West Ham result, and the club has been killing me this season. Just killing me. I'm feeling too beaten to try to talk about it right now.

But I still love West Ham, and I'll always love West Ham. I just don't always like West Ham, if that makes sense. Or I don't like what West Ham do to me. To those of you who actually make it to every match, I admire your determination. I wouldn't want to have to pay your bar tabs, though. They must be colossal this season.

Anyway, tomorrow might be tough for seeing whether we can bounce back against West Brom. I can't find us on TV anywhere in the US, and I can't find us on ESPN3, either. So check out Foxsoccer.tv or dig around for a stream...if you can stand it. And take a deep breath--things look bad, but it's not over yet, even if it feels that way.

Oh, and yes, we appear to have "won" the Olympic Stadium. I'm not too happy about that, either, but we'll talk about that some other time.

COYI

Blackpool v West Ham on ESPN3.com

2011-02-02T15:00:00.000-05:00

It's on pretty much right now. If you get ESPN3.com, click on over.

Two Cups and a Keane

2011-02-02T00:51:00.001-05:00

Are things actually looking up just a tiny bit? Sure, we're still bottom of the table, and we crashed out of the Carling Cup in spectacular fashion, blowing what was essentially a 3-1 lead in Birmingham and not even managing to take the second semi-final leg to penalties. Did anybody think we were going to win after Birmingham equalized? Of course not.

But we didn't really want the Carling Cup, did we? (Yes...) We're more of an FA Cup club. The old jug is our trophy, the one we've won three times, the gong most associated with West Ham other than the World Cup. So, there was some joy last weekend when we managed to beat Nottingham Forest 3-2 thanks to a Victor Obinna hat trick. Never mind that a victory over Forest would have been a lot more impressive in 1981; we'll take what we can get at this point.

Part of supporting West Ham is holding on to eternal optimism while knowing that everything will eventually end in tears. Fortune's always hiding and all that. So, even though our odds of winning the FA Cup are long, I'm fully on the FA Cup bandwagon. Burnley at home shouldn't pose too much of a challenge in the fifth round, right? Right? Doesn't matter. In a season of misery and with our most realistic shot at a trophy having gone "the West Ham way," I'll cling to whatever this club gives me.

Of course, today (it's just past midnight on the East Coast), we're back in league action away to Blackpool. Between now and Feb. 12, we have Blackpool, Birmingham and West Brom (A, H, A, in case you were wondering). Nine points. Seriously, we need nine points. Seven at a minimum. This is a massively important run in our fixture list. Aiding us, of course, will be old enemy and one-time Liverpool castoff Robbie Keane.

For some reason--again, that optimism thing--I'm excited about Robbie Keane coming on board. OK, so he's not Carlos Tevez. But if he can pump in eight or 10 goals for us in key matches, we might just have a chance to play in the Premiership again next season--which, by the way, is the only way we'll keep Robbie Keane with us, as his contract will be void if we get relegated. We'll see how much he cares about West Ham and his own career.

Between Wayne Bridge and Robbie Keane, we've got a great squad--for, say, 2004. Bridge is looking more comfortable every time he plays, though, and I'm hoping that Keane will become a scoring force to match the great (seriously, I'm not being ironic) Jonathan Spector, who has gone from goat to something close to hero this season.

Of course, our main problem is that we continue to leak goals, especially against better sides. Avram Grant hasn't done much to address that in the transfer window, so we might need some firepower up front (and some confidence) in order to avoid the drop. If nothing else, we might at least be in for some entertaining football in the weeks to come. And we've still got that FA Cup run going...

I can't find the Blackpool match on a TV listing anywhere, so we'll all have to check out Foxsoccer.tv or dig for a stream. Evidently, Fox Soccer Channel and Fox Soccer Plus have plenty of time to air matches from the mid-'90s but can't manage to get us on TV at all for this one. Thanks a lot...

COYI

TV for Carling Cup Semi-final Second Leg

2011-01-26T00:29:00.001-05:00

This is a big one, no question. Our second leg Carling Cup semi-final match in Birmingham will be on Fox Soccer Plus at 2:40 EST Wednesday afternoon, live. Set your DVRs or just skip work. This could lead to one of the most important moments in West Ham history.

COYI

Everton 2-2 West Ham: Nooooooooooooooooooo

2011-01-24T18:10:00.000-05:00

A scintillating match. West Ham looking the best we've looked maybe all season. Wayne Bridge settling in nicely. Jonathan Spector on the score sheet again. Goodison Park looking wonderfully '70s in hazy low-def. And there's a centering ball for Frederic Piquionne...he scores! He scores! It's 1-2 to West Ham in the 85th minute! We have a lifeline! We're off the bottom!

But wait...what's he doing? What...? He jumped the advertising boards to celebrate with West Ham supporters. That's an automatic yellow, nailed down. And doesn't he already have... Nooooooooooo! Piquionne is sent off! He's sent off! We're down to 10 men. But that's OK. We have this. We can handle five more minutes plus injury time. We can...

No, we couldn't, and we didn't. We all know by now that the ultimate nightmare played itself out as Everton equalized against 10 men in injury time and sent us back to the bottom of the table. Piq was a hero for us on Saturday, but with one thrust of emotion he might have doomed us. There's nothing to say about this except that maybe we're just destined to go down.

This team battled on Saturday, twice took the lead and looked like saving the season with Piq's goal. It was all so...perfect. And then it all came apart. It would be easy to blame Piq for doing something really stupid, but he had just put us ahead. He was pumped. He probably never thought about being sent off. He should have, but...

And then there were the 10 mean left over, the players who needed to only kill the match in order to give us life again, to give us breathing room for the first time this season. I don't know why they couldn't do it. I have no explanation, only resignation--resignation to the fact that we went from safe right back to being the "red lantern," as the French would say, in a matter of minutes. If I was numb coming into this match from our series of terrible performances, I'm numb and deflated now. This result--not a bad one, objectively speaking--was deflating and felt like a loss, or worse. It felt like the end when it should have been a new beginning.

We have a chance to make the Carling Cup final with a win or draw in Birmingham on Wednesday. At least the Carling Cup has served as a much-needed--and very exciting, so far--distraction from this season. After Saturday, I could use a diversion.

COYI

TV for Everton Away

2011-01-22T01:48:00.000-05:00

It's Everton v West Ham on delay at 6 pm on Fox Soccer Plus tomorrow--oops, that should say today. It's past 1 am, so we're well into Saturday already. Sorry about that. Anyway, if you don't have Fox Soccer Plus, get it--it's totally worth it.

So, you can wake up early tomorrow (that is, today...) and find a stream (or try out Foxsoccer.tv), or you can stay off of the Web until 6 and watch the match quasi-live. I promise not to write anything here until the game has ended on FS+. In fact, I probably won't write anything until quite a while after that.

Needless to say, we really need this one.

COYI

West Ham 0-3 Arsenal: Sick and Dying

2011-01-17T23:04:00.000-05:00

I'm going to put about as much effort into this post as West Ham put into Saturday's match at home to Arsenal. Actually, I think by typing one sentence (now two), I've worked considerably harder than most of our players did on the weekend. I'm West Ham and will always be West Ham and only West Ham, but I am losing faith in our ability to stay up this season. Very little has changed since August, so there's no need for me to rehash what I've written here 50 times before.

Now, with the West Ham board actually trying to do the right thing and sack Avram Grant, the survival plan has hit the skids again. Martin O'Neill, our designated savior--and a manager I'd love to see in East London--has apparently decided that he doesn't want to manage West Ham, meaning that the manager we're likely to have at the end of what looks like a relegation season is...Avram Grant. (I'm not sure where the talk about Sam Allardyce has gone--hopefully far away.)

This is a moribund club run by two pornographers and a mouthy woman who, thus far, has been all hat and no cattle, as we'd say in Texas. Our manager is almost literally a walking corpse in more ways than one, and nobody else in the managerial ranks wants to touch us with a ten-foot pole. Our players have quit on their boss and on the season, and we're drifting away at the bottom of the table--where we've been all season. Hey, at least we have the Carling Cup...seriously. We could win our first trophy in three decades and still go down--how very West Ham.

West Ham, I'm not angry with you because I hate you. I'm angry because I love you and I know that you can do better. This disappointment is bitter, and it just gets worse all the time. Top down, we're an ailing club right now. Just call us Victor Meldrew because we've got one foot in the grave. I've already put way more effort into this post than I should have, so I'll leave things there.

COYI

How Did We Get Here?

2011-01-12T20:39:00.000-05:00

Whoa, that was weird. Everything just got wavy for a minute there, and I felt as though I was awaking from a dream, kind of the way characters used to awake from dreams in '70s sitcoms.

What's that? The calendar reads Jan. 12? Whoa, it's been a while. When I faded out on Christmas Eve, things were looking up for West Ham just a little bit. Let's see where we are now... Up a goal in the Carling Cup semi-final headed to the second leg in Birmingham, pretty good. Still in the FA Cup after our first match, great (hey, I take nothing for granted).

Now, let's have a look at that tab...arrrggghhhh, what's this? We're STILL on the bottom of the table? With an extra game played (or two) compared to our fellow relegation strugglers? OK, so we're only five points from Liverpool(!), which sits in 13th. Still, we're anchoring the table as we have been all season long. What happened?

OK, I know what happened. I took a break from writing this blog, but I never took a break from following West Ham. It's impossible for me to do that. As encouraged as I was after Boxing Day and New Year's Day, the 5-0 disaster away to Newcastle should have been Avram Grant's last match. We have 16 matches left in this season, including five against Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal and Tottenham. That means that pretty much every other match is very nearly a must-win.

Is Avram Grant the manager to get us those wins? It looked as though he might be until we went to St. James Park and capitulated. At that point, Brady and the Davids should have put Avram out of his misery (and ours), cups be damned. Yes, cups be damned. As much as I would love for us to win a trophy (the Carling Cup--and we have a great chance) for the first time in 31 years, at this point in the history of English football nothing is more important than staying up.

Just think of Leicester, Coventry, Ipswich, QPR, Crystal Palace--clubs that spent a few (or many) years in the top flight, went down and never came back. That could be us. Think it couldn't happen? That's probably what they thought, too. We simply cannot afford--literally, in a financial sense--to be one of those clubs. We must stay up. We must have a manager who can keep us up--something Avram Grant couldn't do with Portsmouth last season.

Of course, all of this begs the question, who would or should replace Avram? Sam Allardyce is a popular name being thrown around, although the thought of Allardyce managing West Ham fills me with the same passion and excitement Julien Faubert felt when he fell asleep on Real Madrid's bench. I don't really have a better suggestion, though, given that Jose Mourinho is otherwise occupied. That's the problem--and it's no doubt a problem for Karren and the Davids, too. We're in a real pickle here.

Plus, Carlos Tevez isn't walking through that door, and although Wayne Bridge is, he doesn't have the look of a savior about him. How we're going to survive this season is, at this point, beyond me. I don't have solutions or even particularly good suggestions. I'm pretty sure, though, that Avram Grant is only going to lead us to the Championship, even if he does also lead us to the Carling Cup. Every time he needs to save his job, he seems to conjure up a win. That would be fine if he could do that week in and week out. But given the first hint of security for their manager, Grant's charges go out and pull a 5-0 loss.

Maybe that's not his fault--but he has to take responsibility. It's time for a change. If we're going to go down, let's go down swinging. Right now, Grant has the feeling of a boxer who's just trying to deflect punches. If it takes Sam Allardyce (God forbid, honestly) to get us back up off the mat, well...actually, no. There must be somebody better. Suggestions more than welcome.

COYI

Holiday Break

2010-12-24T14:13:00.000-05:00

Fellow Hammers, I've taken a bit of a break from this blog to travel for the holidays. So, I won't be discussing the Blackburn away draw (actually not a bad result considering Blackburn's home record) in detail--not that you didn't see it yourself, anyway.

I'll try to be back here around Boxing Day for the Fulham match, and then things get very busy after that for the Hammers and me. From Dec. 26 through Jan. 5, West Ham play Fulham, Everton, Wolves and Newcastle. (Could we go 12 for 12? At this point, I'd happily take six points.) I'll be on the road that whole time (headed from Texas to California to see my alma mater, TCU, play in the Rose Bowl). So, reports here might be kind of sporadic, but I'll try to at least let you know when and where our matches will be on TV in the US.

In the meantime, merry Christmas, happy holidays, etc. etc. Ask Santa (or Father Christmas) for some much-needed wins for the Irons. And since Avram Grant probably doesn't believe in Santa, we might as well appeal to Hanukkah Harry as well.

COYI

Blackburn v West Ham at 2 pm Saturday on FSPlus

2010-12-18T00:27:00.000-05:00

Whew! Almost missed this one. We're not on live this weekend, but you won't have to wait long to catch our match away to Blackburn. It'll be on Fox Soccer Plus at 2 pm Eastern.

COYI

West Ham 1-3 Man City: Frustration

2010-12-14T01:47:00.000-05:00

I'm starting to wonder whether we've just given up. West Ham used to be at our best when big clubs came into the Boleyn. Our problem was competing with Bolton, not giving Chelsea or Arsenal a good scrap. But now we don't seem to be able to beat anybody in the league, and we seem to just fly the white flag when "big clubs" turn up at our place (other than in the Carling Cup, of course).

Again last weekend, we surrendered relatively meekly to now mighty Manchester City. Avram Grant put out a strong lineup. His tactics weren't terrible. We produced a few moments of promise--but we were nevertheless down 3-0 before James Tomkins spared our goal differential a bit. Where has the fight gone? Where is the pride? Why can't we reproduce in the league the performances we've seen in the Carling Cup?

We now sit four points from safety and three points from Wolves! It's not early in the season anymore. It's not time to let our new players get settled. It's not time for patience. It's time for panic, for urgency. It's time to treat every league game like a cup tie. I don't know whether our players have it in them. They're not bad, and Grant is a competent manager. But, clearly, something's not working. Do we just lack heart? And, if so, how do we get it back?

COYI

West Ham v Man City Live on ESPN2 at 10 am EST Saturday

2010-12-10T15:57:00.000-05:00

Yes! Winnable match or not, at least we'll get to see the Boleyn tomorrow in the best HD on TV. Our clash with Man City will be live on ESPN2 at 10 am Eastern. ESPN HD generally makes FSC HD look like TV from the '80s.

For the record, I want to clarify that I'm still very much pro-Jonathan Spector and want to see him start in our midfield tomorrow. Calling him "plain old Jonathan" in my last entry was harsh; he played well against Sunderland and deserves to be on the pitch at the opening whistle tomorrow based on recent performances. Besides, if he could turn over Big Brother from Manchester, why shouldn't he be able to topple Little Brother as well?

I smell an unexpected three points and a major turnaround coming our way. I really do. Well, I smell something, anyway. I think that's what it is.

COYI

Sunderland 1-0 West Ham: Opportunity Missed

2010-12-07T02:14:00.000-05:00

I am not moved, I must say, to write about this match. It was boring, and we were awful. Diego Pele Spector went back to being plain old Jonathan, and Carlton Cole inexplicably got a start over the much better Frederic Piquionne. (Yes, Cole scored twice against Manchester United, but those were goals three and four--not exactly clutch.)

The bottom line, of course, is that we missed an opportunity to make a serious stride toward avoiding relegation. With three points, we could have been close to exiting the drop zone, trailing Fulham only on goal differential. Now, we're still three points from safety and five points from anything resembling comfort. It's December. This is starting to get serious.

Rumor has it that Spurs and Liverpool are after Scotty Parker. Obviously, we can't sell him. Other than that, what are we supposed to do? I'm at a loss. If only our league form could match our league cup form. At this point, although I've called for it repeatedly, I'd hate to see Avram Grant fired. He has us in a cup semi-final, and he is a proven cup manager (although he has a tendency to lose finals). We simply can't afford relegation, though. As much fun as a Carling Cup trophy--our first gong since 1980--would be, we have to improve our league form. How, I have no idea, and I'm kind of getting tired of thinking about it.

COYI

Sunderland v West Ham Sunday at 11 am EST on FSC

2010-12-03T19:00:00.000-05:00

It's live...it's in HD....it's a match against a side we actually have a shot of beating. Our match oop north at Sunderland will be live on Fox Soccer Channel at 11 am Eastern Sunday. Yes, 11 am (not 10) on Sunday (not Saturday). Watch to see whether we unleash Diego Pele Spector on the unsuspecting Black Cats.

COYI

West Ham 4-0 Manchester United: The Legend of Jonathan Spector

2010-12-02T00:54:00.000-05:00

It was a team effort and all that, our mystical, dream-like, ultimately unforgettable 4-0 Carling Cup win over the Mancs in a snow-globe Boleyn. Plenty of credit to go around and so forth. But let's be honest: This match was about one man, and his name is Jonathan Spector.

If I were going to live vicariously through any player in world football, it would be Johnny Specs. He's American. He plays for West Ham. What else is there? (Well, he could be from Texas rather than from Chicago, but that's belaboring a point. And I love Chicago, anyway.) Johnny Specs is living the dream at 24, playing in the Premiership and doing what still relatively few Yanks have managed to do--sustain a career in English football.

But as we all know, the dream has mostly been a nightmare of late. Specs has seen little action this season, and forced into action last season, he drew the ire of fans, some of whom voted him the club's worst player. That vote was massively unfair on a number of levels. First of all, Spector wasn't all that bad. (Any side with Julien Faubert in it should have its worst-player award sealed before the season even begins.)

More importantly, though, Gianfranco Zola had Specs playing out of position--way out of position. A natural center midfielder, Specs lined up for Zola's sides at left back--which is unfortunate, given that he's not even left-footed. Right back, at least, would have made more sense, but match after match Johnny dutifully served in the wrong position on the wrong side of the field.

And so he toiled, and then he sat. Ridiculed and booed by fans and seemingly forgotten by management, Specs never complained. He trained hard, stayed focused, didn't cause disruptions and waited his turn. In other words, he was everything that most modern footballers aren't: hard-working, quiet and patient and grateful to have the opportunity to make a living as a footballer.

In that sense, he was the classic American, like a character in a movie who shuns the spotlight in favor of busting his ass and beating the odds. A person given to cliches might have said that there was no quit in Jonathan Spector. He was Rocky--the original Rocky, punching sides of beef in meat lockers and running up the steps of the art museum in Philadelphia. He just needed a storybook ending.

On Tuesday, he got it. Finally, a manager--well done, Avram Grant--started Spector in central midfield. He replaced living legend Scotty Parker, easily the most popular player at West Ham today (and rightfully so). After years of quietly doing his best in unfamiliar territory, Spector got a chance to show what kind of player he was. And that's what he did.

After his first goal was (rightfully) disallowed, Jonathan Spector set the frozen Boleyn on fire. Credit where it's due, the increasingly important Victor Obinna set up both of his goals. But this is Johnny Specs's post, and Tuesday was his night. His first strike, a flat-out header in which he did his best Bobby Orr impression, so shocked the crowd that there was almost a delayed reaction to it. Who scored? Really?

One goal, it turned out, would have been enough to win the match. But nobody knew that in the 36th minute when, like a pale Diego Maradona, Spector took the ball near the center stripe. He deftly charged through the Man U midfield--as few of our players seem willing to do these days--and deep into the penalty area before slipping the ball to Obinna. A couple of passes later, Man U defender Fabio slipped on the glassy Boleyn turf. That's when Spector, who had followed up on his brilliant run, pounced, cat-like, on the loose ball and hammered it home.

Slip or not, it was a magnificent goal, a goal scorer's goal--a hero's strike right through the heart of one of the biggest clubs in the world (and Spector's former club, at that). The crowd erupted. Specs sprinted with joy and hugged Obinna. A few minutes later, when the PA announcer called his name for his second goal, the West Ham crowed cheered Jonathan Spector with vigor and delight. It must have been a moment of redemption for him, maybe the greatest moment of his career. I got emotional. I won't hide that.

On Tuesday night, Jonathan Spector, our man in East London, the lad living out every American West Ham supporter's dream, etched his name in West Ham lore for eternity. Maybe he'll get a run out Sunday at Sunderland. (He should--with Parker in midfield and in place of the derelict Radoslav Kovac.) Maybe he'll light up Birmingham in the Carling Cup semifinals in January. Maybe he'll go back to relative anonymity. Maybe he'll move on, as rumors have suggested he might.

But no matter where he goes from here, Johnny Specs will have a legacy in East London that's not that of a maladroit Yank who didn't quite cut it at left back. He'll instead be the unlikely hero who tore Manchester United apart in one of the most memorable nights in West Ham's history. When West Ham supporters think of him, that's what they'll remember (unless, of course, he goes on to do more remarkable things).

The story of Jonathan Spector is a story of redemption, a story of patience, a story of hard work and dedication over ego and greed. And after a famous Carling Cup quarterfinal performance against one of the giants of the game, it's now the story of a West Ham legend.

COYI

USA! USA! Jonathan Spector Downs Mighty Manchester United

2010-12-01T00:23:00.000-05:00

In case you've missed it somehow, we've moved on to the Carling Cup semifinal--in astonishing fashion. And the hero was none other than our man in East London, Jonathan Spector. This is reality: West Ham 4-0 Man U, with Johnny Specs scoring the first two in the snow at the Boleyn. Simply unbelievable. I'll ramble on about this at considerable length sometime tomorrow, but for now let's just enjoy one of our greatest victories in years. USA!

COYI

West Ham v Manchester United Carling Cup Match Live Now on FS Plus

2010-11-30T15:19:00.003-05:00

Mea culpa for not even knowing about this until this very moment, but our Carling Cup quarterfinal against Man U is on Fox Soccer Plus...right now! (It's almost 3:20 pm EST on Tuesday.) You can catch the end of the first half and all of the second if you tune in immediately. Or, set that DVR from wherever you are, avoid the score and watch the game when you get home.

UPDATE: Fox Soccer Plus will replay this match at 8 pm EST tonight (Tuesday). I'll hold off on discussing it until the replay's over, just in case...

COYI

West Ham 3-1 Wigan: Season Saved?

2010-11-28T16:18:00.000-05:00

So, apparently, the West Ham board promoted yesterday's game as the match to "save our season," slashed ticket prices and managed to get a healthy crowd of 34,000-plus into the Boleyn Ground on what looked like a chilly day. It was the perfect set-up for a classic West Ham disappointment.

Then, something unusual happened. We didn't disappoint. We put in a fantastic, concerted effort, went up 3-0, managed not to choke away the advantage and ran out 3-1 winners. A few good things have already come of this. We're still bottom of the table, but we're now just three points from safety. Our goal differential (-12) is now not the the worst in the division anymore; Wigan's (-15) is. And we're only two goals to the positive away from catching Wolves (-10) in that department. As we all know, goal differential matters in a relegation scrap.

So, what happened? Why did we go from pathetic to half decent in the space of a week? Well, not playing at Anfield helped, and playing fellow strugglers Wigan helped even more. But there was also some addition by subtraction in Avram Grant's 4-4-2. In were Scott Parker, Junior Stanislas, James Tomkins, Pablo Barrera and Valon Behrami. Out, in comparison to the starting XI that flopped in Liverpool, were Herita Ilunga, Radoslav Kovac, Luis Boa Morte, Mark Noble and Carlton Cole.

Now, Noble is injured, and he'll likely be welcomed back into the side when he's healthy again. As for the rest of the pine-riders, though, did we really miss them? Apparently not. Cole has been moody all season and has never been a consistently potent striker, anyway. He did little coming in a substitute yesterday--although he didn't need to do much at that point in the match. Frederic Piquionne looked very lively and combined nicely with Victor Obinna for the latter's goal, which ended up being the game winner.

Stanislas looked positively fiery, especially in the first half, before he started to tire a bit late on. Nevertheless, he was a spark of pace and creativity in a side that has looked mostly moribund for weeks. Tomkins was solid; Barrera, who has largely been a disappointment, was much better than usual, and Behrami, who scored, was an enormous presence during the full 90 minutes. Welcome back to him. Parker, of course, is Parker. He's a legend, and he tallied for us again. He's going above and beyond the call of duty for his club this season.

Kovac also came on as a sub very late on and didn't have to do much, and Boa Morte never saw a blade of grass in the white rectangle. It's hard not to think that not only were we better with the likes of Junior and Valon in the side, but we were also better because players such as Boa Morte and the fading Ilunga weren't there. Yesterday's team had cohesion and showed effort, two things we've been sorely lacking throughout most of this season. Oh, and Rob Green was fantastic again--all credit to him, particularly with the penalty save.

Even Winston Reid, already dismissed as a bust by many, was anonymous and therefore innocuous when he came on for a limping Lars Jacobsen after 50 minutes. (Actually, it's Danny Gabbidon, gifter of the penalty Green saved, who's suddenly looking like the weak link in defense.) So, after all the shots taken at Avram Grant here and elsewhere, was it the players who were causing the problems all along this season? Well, maybe. A healthy Behrami and a renewed Stanislas were major assets yesterday. Piquionne and Obinna, fixtures in the side this season, looked more dangerous than they have in weeks.

Is that it, then? Has Grant found the combination that will save our season? To say the least, the jury's still out there. This was a match that went exactly the way it should have--we won fairly easily at home over a weak opponent. Granted, we've dropped tons of points this season by not doing exactly that, so yesterday's win feels like a triumph when it was, in fact, just a good performance. Next comes Manchester United in the Carling Cup, a total wild card. After that, though, it's Sunderland away, City at home, Rovers away and Fulham away. We should get a minimum of seven points from those four games--if we actually are going to save our season.

COYI