With over 5,000 Hammers fans travelling up North to the Hawthorns this weekend, West Ham have been left embarrassed and disappointed by Saturday’s 4-0 defeat at the hands of Tony Pulis’ West Brom. In unceremonious style, Big Sam’s boys simply failed to assert any kind of dominance in the match, looked uncharacteristically shaky at the back, and ultimately a complete non event up top. The punishing goals came from a well taken James Morrison effort, an almost inevitable Saido Berahino strike, and a brace from the recently in-form Brown Ideye. If things looked like they couldn’t get any worse however, West Ham’s Morgan Amalfitano mindlessly struck out at Chris Brunt, in what was nothing but a silly move, immediately ruling him out of the next three matches through suspension.
The Hammers just didn’t turn up. With Sam Allardyce being quick to blame the amount of matches his side have had to contend with in the last week, the likes of Diafra Sakho and Enner Valencia barely got a touch up front, let alone a shot, and both James Tomkins and Cheikhou Kouyate failed to establish even a glimpse of the defensive chemistry that had served them well in the past two games. As for the midfield, the word ‘pace’ doesn’t exactly come to mind.
This was quite easily the club’s worst performance/result of the season, and to the widespread frustration of the Upton Park faithful, rules out another potentially exciting cup run this season. Because no player in claret and blue shone themselves in a distinctly positive light against West Brom, a match report on each of their performances would seemingly be a pointless task…
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