Not really West Ham

A strange sense that West Ham are not really responsible for our teams performance has crept up on me and seem to have infected the mindset of quite a few fans on West Ham related sites and forums. There is a clear sign that more people than usual are trying to distance themselves from the present results as well as from the present XI. Even though “we’re better than this” and “if it wasn’t for…” are probably the most common thoughts in the heads of fans on the losing side, I think we have taken it a step further.
“It’s the Puffins fault, we’ve had a continuous drain of talent and have not been able to buy the right players for the Zola way of football, and on top of that we’ve had our most valuable players injured.” are the current mantras.
Now this is all true but it is in no way unique to the 2009/2010 season or, for that matter West Ham. We’ve lost talented players to better paying/performing sides before and it would be downright naïve to hope that it will not happen in the future. There are, believe it or not, also other teams that have experience of limited transfer budgets, and the need to finance a reshaping of a squad by the sale of players. Take a look at Fulham where funds have been scarce but where the leaders adapts the way of playing football to the situation. They are fielding West Ham rejects for crying out loud!

An intriguing question is, would we win football games with the Fulham squad?

Obviously not having the players that we fancy hamper our performance, but the job of the executive leaders at the club is to get on with it and work with the situation at hand. Adapt the game plan to the current situation and maybe realize that adding one or two players to the existing squad may not transform it to a squad able to play 433 against a well organized PL side with great success. The players we field are West Ham and it’s West Ham that is losing the games, not the Icelanders! Fix the obvious things that are wrong with the team performance instead of blaming our lack of fortune on the financial crisis and the greed of some Icelandic creditors!

Why on earth did I write this shitty post today? Not quite sure, but I blame the Puffins!