I will not present a case for his defence. MotM and in the Team of the Week FFS. Don't make me laugh. Would you want him in a Saints shirt? I wouldn't.
I'll not criticise West Ham as a football club. We've had periods of not only poor teams but poor management, I'd mention Br..f..t, but I'd have to wash my mouth out. The serious point is that Big Sam and Tony Pulis support a style of football that negates footballing skills in favour of brute force. When football pitches were mud heaps for half a season there was some reason to this style of play. Now we play on bowling greens with balls that are feather light, in enclosed stadia where the wind is much less of a factor. Big Sam is still getting results, but the style of play is designed around survival rather than progression. There is no doubt that winning second ball is an art that he has coached assiduously, however if you have not got the ball to start with the art becomes largely redundant. Pulis has discovered his side is being found out, and his rallying call seems to be more of the same with greater intensity. Neither will succeed in a premier league and will eventually fail.
Yes the Brantfoot era was terrible, but we had Le Tiss don't forget. I would watch long ball all day to see one glimpse of genius.
I nearly gave up watching football when Branfoot was our manager. God that was awful football but we knew it was awful and we didn't want it. West Ham fans seem not too bothered about Fat Sam's style of football.
If they're in a reli battle every year I think they might. I remember holding up the red cards when I was about 9!
That's because it's nowhere near as negative or predictable as you suggest. Not normally, anyway. But as I had to miss Saturday's game and only saw the highlights on MOTD, I'll defer to your description of their dire football at St Mary's - though that's not quite how it was described to me by other people who were there.
I think they've got enough quality in that side to keep the fans coming back. And whilst they've gained a reputation for stopping the opposition and killing the game away from home, at the Boleyn they're probably a lot more entertaining. A long ball that finds it target is a pass, btw, not a hoof. Matty used to play lots of them.
Are you saying that a 65 yard side footed lob that gets headed away just before it reaches the striker is a hoof, but a directionless toe punt that bounces off a striker's arse is a pass? Because that's what most of West Ham's passes are - lumps downfield in Carroll's general direction hoping he struggles onto it.
If it bounces off the strikers arse into the goal, it's a pass. Not if it's a toe punt, though. Seriously, as Gary Linaker said on MOTD, quoting Bob Paisley I think, "it's not about the long ball or the short ball, it's about the right ball."
Use of the word "probably" suggests you don't know. Your point about their quality in the side is valid, but that underlines my point about their style even more; they just don't have to play like that. You really think they played long passes on Saturday? Fair play, because I certainly didn't see many. I saw a lot of 50:50 long passes. In my books that's a hoof. Using Matty as a comparison with that lot or if not a direct comparison, even in the same sentence.... wash your mouth
Archers, I don't get your defending them. Of course there's a right ball, but Liverpool under Paisley played long direct passes to a player or to the immediate space the player was running freely into. West Ham didn't do that. They played long balls to where a crowd of players were, hoping to win a 50:50. It is a tactic imagree, but it is not a pass. There is a massive, massive difference between a long/direct pass and a hoofed 50;50 ball. Your argument here is the very reason England are crap at top international football. We don't understand the difference between a long pass and a 50:50 pass. I call it the English Disease.
Ill add one more comment to this. If you can bear doing it, watch a re-run of the game. There was one moment in the second half where either their CB or FB had the ball in space and Gary O'Neil stood in the centre circle pointing directly upwards to the sky. He wasn't pointing upwards and forwards towards our area where their strikers were, he was pointing and gesticulating directly upwards. Now forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think he's wanted that ball knocked as high in the air as possible, unless of course he wanted someone to "pass" to God and get the return.
If you lump a high ball up field and it finds one of your own, that's a pass, if it finds the opposition, or goes out of play, that's a hoof.
None were long passes. It's a simple strategy that many managers use as Plan B (including Adkins at times.) 1 - Boot ball over midfield to edge of opponents box. 2 - Striker or strikers challenge for the ball. Often better if defender wins the aerial battle and because striker was challenging the clearance doesn't go as far. 3 - Midfielders run forward to challenge for the ball at the breakdown (after the partially headed clearance) Best result is the midfield has now joined attack and 6 of your players are within sight of the eighteen yard box. It is funny how our goal came from this sort of situation on Saturday. It's even funnier that it came against Hoof Ham. It's even even funnier that they deny they play this way. And it's great that we very very rarely do this at all. Admittedly Adkins was using this tactic more and more often.
So you post several posts criticising our opinion of west ham's performance and then I realise that you didn't go to the game but watched MOTD and took other people's opinion. Do you live next door to Fat Sam? Credibility plunge.
You could see that both teams played different styles when the respective goalkeepers had the ball. when Borcu had the ball, the Saints team was spread out across the pitch in your standard defence-midfield-striker formation. When West Ham had the ball all the outfield players were crowded around the centre line (and they abandoned the left wing completely) There's nothing wrong with the occasional long ball. Sometimes you pass your way through the opposition, sometimes you knock it over the top and hope that your striker gets their before the defenders. By mixing up the tactics, the opposition won't know what you plan to do. Ironically, we scored from a long ball on Saturday. However, consistent use of the long ball makes for a dull uninteresting match.
