First Post: Moyes In vs Moyes Out
19th Feb 2024 - View of a Unknown West Ham fan
It's that time again. Those few days after a miserable Saturday where feelings of hope were dampened by a lacklustre performance from a team far more capable than they've shown in recent weeks.
To add to the misery, fans are at each other's throats, Moyes in vs Moyes out.. pick a side please.
It's all quite funny really. At a time when we could probably do with banding together, we’re at each others throats.
Conversations meant for the pub are instead playing out on Twitter and Facebook and nuanced banter is being misinterpreted though written word. Everyone just needs to chill out a bit.
It's emotional being a hammers fan and I think we've all learned first hand that despite our best intent, emotions can sometimes get the best of us. In hindsight we realise that we tend to jump the gun or get a bit carried away
Let's assess a few things.
Is Moyes the world's best manager? No
Does he think he is? He probably considers himself up there.
Does he get things wrong? Yes
Does he take responsibility? No.
In fact more recently than not it's been quite the opposite. He has an excuse for everything and laments on his win percentage as if he's a tactical genius who's cooked up a masterplan for every one goal win that he's managed to scrape together.
The "Moyes Problem" has existed for years. He's a good solid middle of the road manager. And he deserves recognition for that. But I think he rates himself a lot higher than his performance actually merits. In his head Moyes is Sir Alex 2.0. Why? Because Sir Alex basically told him so.
Now we all understand the idea that in order to find success in life you need to back yourself. But it's hard to tell whether Moyes is just really self assured or borderline delusional at times. And that right there is likely the problem.
West Ham fans are happy to accept we won't win the league. We'll accept relegation scraps do happen and are realistic for the most part when it comes to understanding how well we should be performing. We'd probably even give Moyes some credit if he came out and admitted that he's currently struggling and is sorry for the poor form and working to turn it around.
Trouble is... he's not. He's not sorry, he feels the criticism of performances is unjust. He feels he's doing nothing wrong. He'll quickly take the praise for winning a cup but tend to conveniently forget the fact that he nearly got us relegated in the process.
Ultimately we seem to be dealing with a man with delusions of grandeur, who seems to think the Conference League is the equivalent of the Champions League.
This is all well and good, but why do most fans feel like a change? Hmm, I dunno, maybe we've tasted glory and now we want more.. maybe we're the delusional ones with lofty expectations... I mean what do we expect, wins and good football?
Well yeah. It's actually that simple. Some good football and a restoration of hope. We all see the mood of the squad. They hate playing the way they're asked to. I mean, even the idea of throwing on the kids would actually gain Moyes some respect back. Imagine that, acknowledging that our overpaid internationals aren't putting in a shift and giving academy prospects an opportunity. Might not be a bad idea if Moyes wants to get some fans back onside. That said, he’s loaned out our best two attacking prospects in Kodua and Marshall, possibly not the smartest move given he also chose to sell two attacking midfielders in Benrahma and Fornals on deadline day and leave the squad incredibly sparse. Not to worry, he brought in Kalvin Phillips. That should provide the creative spark we’ve been missing.
In reality, Moyes doesn’t feel any need to listen to the fans. He doesn’t seem to respect us and prefers to lecture us on how grateful we should all be for being blessed with his presence. Unfortunately being as devoted as we are to suffer through dire displays out of an almost duty-bound sense of self, we witness it all. We see patterns. We see lucky results and understand the context to combat the narrative that’s often portrayed by mainstream pundits and ex players who judge our performances on the scoreline alone. As with most things in life, you can often limp through for a while, or get the most out of something through cleaning or repairing, but we all know that eventually that wheel is gonna fall off and we'll need a plan for when it does. The difficulty right now is in trying to comprehend how anyone could have watched our games over the last two years and expected it not to get to this point.
On the plus side, I think Tim Steidten probably did predict this. I think Kretinsky is fully aware and Sully is learning the hard way.
Steidten came in with a vision. A vision for the club and one that fits the makeup of modern day football. He can talk to players. He can get deals done that Moyes would kill through his need to instil discipline in a potential signing and scare them off as a result. We have current academy graduates in Divine Mubama and Ben Johnson refusing to sign new deals due to a lack of playing time. We lost young talent Harrison Ashby due to Moyes refusing to use him. Moyes came in to stabilise the club. Steidten is ready to write the next chapter. But to do so, he needs to be given control. A good start was the signings of Kudus, Alvarez and Mavrapanos. All young up and comers who Moyes would no doubt have turned down or scared off. The January window however saw us revert back to our old ways - Moyes went pragmatic and signed a defensive midfielder based on the player he was three years ago. It was clearly an indulgence, someone Moyes wanted but didn’t need. We currently have one creative midfielder - an injured Lucas Paqueta. A player whose absence clearly highlights the manager's reliance on his presence. Without him, Moyes can’t win games of football. Failing to have a single similar understudy is Moyes’ own fault.
So where do I stand? I think it’s quite simple, just let Moyes go. Let him ride off into the sunset and continue to consider himself a Hammers legend and the most successful manager we've ever had. Let him go to dinner parties with other managers and try to convince himself that his conference league medal looks a lot like a champions league medal if you view it from a distance and squint a bit.
The fact is, Moyes is a far better manager than most that exist in the world. But he's not a top manager. He just isn't. He's been a manager for 26 years and won the charity shield and the Conference League.
One's essentially a pre-season friendly and the other is a third tier European competition that's existed since 2021.
Despite these years of experience, his style of play and pragmatic approach haven’t evolved from his days at Everton.
For those who aren’t West Ham fans and can’t understand why some of us feel this way, I thought I’d provide some context.. To the talksport pundits, the ex players and opposition fans who continue to push this rhetoric of Hammers fans being unappreciative or asking for too much, hopefully this may offer some insight.
Firstly, the Europa Conference League. I’ll start this off simply. It’s not the Europa League. The amount of pundits that gravitate to Moyes winning a European trophy as the be all and end all to justify him keeping his job is just astonishing. They often even refer to it as the Europa League. It’s a completely different competition. There are levels you know. If Moyes had won the Europa League, we’d have been playing in the Champions League this season and obviously that’d change the entire conversation. I’d argue, that kind of achievement would justify him keeping his job. On that note - we’re still in the Europa League. So if he wins it, does he deserve a new contract? In my opinion, yes. Do I see it happening? No. But would I have to swallow my pride and admit that he’d proven me wrong? Absolutely.
Even still, would I want him to stay? No. Why? Because I don’t think he suits the direction that the club needs to go in.To provide some context about our Europa CONFERENCE League title, I think it’s only right to look at the numbers. Below is a list of the giants that were slayed to win the conference league and their market valuation:
Staeau Bucurest - €30.58m
AEK Lamaka - €14.13m
Silkeborg - €14.03m
AZ Alkmaar - €106.00m
Gent - €69.90m
Anderlecht - €96.70m
Fiorentina - €246.90m
By comparison: West Ham - €440.60m
For context, Championship Leicester are valued at €224.50m and Bristol City at €40.00m.
Our average salary is nearly four times that of Anderlecht and double that of the team we beat in the final. Every other team we beat, spend less on wages than Bristol City. Hammers fans would understand the Bristol reference, given they dumped us out of the FA Cup this year.
Now I don't want to suggest that winning a trophy just happens, but these European fixtures tend not to compare to the latter stages of even the league cup where we inevitably always fall short.
In reality, the CONFERENCE league is by far the easiest club competition any premier league club will compete for. I'm probably not alone in predicting that plenty of mid table premier league teams will win it in the next few years. Moyes would probably then consider himself a pioneer for being the first Premier league manager to do so.
I'd argue that getting to the semi finals of the Europa League the year before was actually more of an achievement. We managed to beat Sevilla, Lyon and one could argue our loss to Eintracht Frankfurt was mainly down to a couple of individual errors, which nobody would really hold the manager responsible for. So there you go Moyes, there's some credit for you.
If we’re to take a similar approach in assessing our performance in the Europa League this year, our opponents have include:
Olympiacos - €116.80m
We are valued as a club at €440.60m, well over double the nearest comparative club in Freiburg. As such, topping our group, while not a foregone conclusion, was certainly not an overachievement. We now face Freiburg again in the round of 16 and will be favourites going into those games.
Of the last 16 teams, we are ranked 5th in terms of market value, but the majority of remaining teams are far more closely matched than prior and it’s likely that the quarter final fixtures won’t include any teams valued under £200m.
On that basis, assessment of our performance in the competition should be held off until that time at the very earliest.
Which brings us to our current situation - without a win in 2024. Now admittedly, our last win was a smash and grab 0-2 at the Emirates in which we managed to leave with all three points despite only having 25% possession and 6 shots compared to Arsenal's 30. If ever a tactical masterclass could have been asserted, it was this game. And I suppose the fine line between tactical astuteness and riding your luck is clearly demonstrated when assessing the return fixture whereby Arsenal enjoyed 71% possession and scored 6 of their 25 shots this time around.
You shouldn’t jump to conclusions over a single result, but you can get a clearer picture from watching multiple games. In the last two seasons, we’ve conceded four or more goals, six times in the Premier League. Those opponents have included Fulham (5), Aston Villa (4), Crystal Palace (4), Brighton (4) and Newcastle (5). Accepting less possession and playing a defensive game is all well and good, but conceding these amounts to “mid table” teams doesn’t exactly fit into the picture of West Ham as a defensively sound unit. Whilst we’ve been able to scrape wins by a single goal quite regularly, these poor defensive displays haven’t been a result of us going for it, but more so us inviting pressure and being completely shown up. These are the games that West Ham fans have sat through, to accompany the often scrappy draws and small margin wins that have resulted from riding our luck.
But we won a trophy and we’ve been in Europe for three years straight! What more can we ask for? Well it’s simple really. To stand still in football is to move backwards. Getting into Europe is one thing, but staying there is another. Based on league form, we won’t be in Europe next year. Last year our league form fell off a cliff when we competed in a lesser European competition, so is it not fair to assess that based on current form and the higher level of European opponents this year, our league form will likely suffer once again?
To be clear, we’re only in Europe this year as a result of our European performance last year and as mentioned previously, it was mainly our spending power that made that a likely outcome. We don’t have that luxury this year. So in all likelihood, it’ll need to be our league form that retains our European status. And well, that brings us full circle in regards to current performances which are well below par.
So what’s the big deal? Well if we’re not in Europe next year, we have less income, less ability to lure top players and our best players will want to move on to teams that are in Europe. This would leave us in a situation requiring a rebuild. On the plus side, we’d have money to spend, but the concerns for West Ham fans are on who’d be in charge of that rebuild. David Moyes, like it or not, is by no means a strong operator in the transfer window. We’ve bought many a player and spent a lot of money only for some true talents to leave for a loss and little positives to say about the manager. Gianluca Scamacca, Javier Hernandez, Danny Ings, Maxwell Cornet, Nikola Vlasic, Sebastien Haller, Pablo Fornals and Said Benrahma all saw massive deteriorations in form and some were seemingly frozen out by the manager at times as they simply don’t suit his system. Some are proven goalscorers, others creative players who simply couldn’t put together consistent performances in a David Moyes system. All have shown moments of brilliance over the years but ultimately seemed to have had their careers stunted by the managers tactics which concentrate on pragmatism, defensive structure and often playing strikers as isolated hold up players, forced to feed off scraps and set pieces.
Paqueta is likely to leave and will need replacing - ironically, the only thing likely to keep the Brazilian playmaker at the club would be the departure of the current manager and a replacement who will commit to playing a more attacking and exciting style of football. If we’re not playing in Europe, the players and fans will want to enjoy some free flowing football. Believe it or not, it’s possible to play a high energy pressing game with an emphasis on unlocking the opposition with creativity and endeavour. It may be the undoing of clubs when you attempt to do this with sub par players playing out from the back and committing a multitude of personal errors, hence why clubs in relegation scraps tend to adopt more pragmatic styles of play. When Moyes joined West Ham, pragmatism was a prerequisite for survival and understandably so. But at what point should you throw caution to the wind and recognise that football is about dreaming and trying to compete. I mean I understand steadying the ship as a concept, but once it’s steady, keep on sailing, don’t drop the anchor and sit in the docks.
As fans, West Ham means a lot to us. More than it’ll ever mean to Moyes. For some people it’s the most important thing in their lives. So why would anyone think that after working all week and then spending hours travelling and a fortune on tickets, fans should accept mediocrity? Why shouldn’t they dream?
I heard an interesting talksport conversation the other day, regarding the Moyes situation. After Ben Foster tells us we should “get a reality check”, he then explains that the teams above us are “real, proper, big clubs”. Darren Bent takes over and wrongly states that Moyes “won the Europa” , explaining he doesn’t know what more Moyes can do to make fans happy. Beyond this, a conversation unfolds about why Moyes should walk away with his head held high, but things get interesting. When asked where he could go, a bunch of clubs get mentioned and are described as too big, or having fans who’d not tolerate his style of football. Eventually they agree that he’d likely end up at a newly promoted team. So after criticising West Ham fans for our unfair assessment of Moyes, they ultimately proved our point for us. Why should we be expected to tolerate his negative football and disrespect towards our fans when they openly admit that other clubs wouldn’t want it either.
The reality is, the club's profile has never been bigger. Our value has never been higher. We’ve never had such a talented squad and money in the bank to continue improving it. We've had a few January transfer windows that presented huge opportunities to strengthen and push on to win the Europa League. But we failed to do so both times. So now we’re at a crossroads. It’s a bit of a gamble, but we’re poised to make a move. A new manager may convince our youngsters to commit their long term futures to the club. This recent crop of youngsters won the FA youth cup and Mark Noble is now the clubs Sporting Director, with a strong focus on promoting talent from our youth academy. Combine this with Tim Steidten, our Technical Director, known for his prowess in identifying and securing hidden gems and it becomes clear that a positive plan is being put into action. But for it to work, we need a more suitable manager, one that understands and agrees with the philosophy of the club. The man currently at the helm has laughed off “the west ham way” for years and truth be told, we’ve not really been in a position to fully embrace this philosophy of entertaining free flowing, expressive football. Not until now. We’ve arrived at this point thanks to Moyes. He’s stabilised the club and taken us to a new level, but it seems even he believes that we’ve reached our limit. So thanks David. We’re all very grateful. You got us here and we appreciate that, but it’s time to part ways.
As for us? The bubbles will fly high, our dreams may fade and die, our fortune’s may be hiding, but we’ll continue to dream. And we’ll do so, United.
