4064 days ago
Given West Ham’s dire form of late I have only just plucked up courage to look at the result on the internet. I was assuming the worst away at Spurs given that, much as I hate to admit it, they are a good side. But blow me down, three nil at White Hart Lane. I was naturally straight on the phone to my daughter to discuss the matter. She has a friend at school who is a diehard Spurs fan and so "shall we sing a song for you?" We ran through a couple of ditties* for her to use for torment payback.
Fat Sam says it was his best result as West Ham’s manager. For today at least I shall not argue with him. Beating the scum away is not something that has happened in 14 years and even the Mrs, who has learned how to ingratiate herself with my daughter with the phrase “my favourite player is Joey Cole” but is not entirely up to speed on life on Green Street, appreciates that this is big.
We had thought that Downton Abbey would be our TV highlight of the day but we can safely say that MOTD 2 is now going to be even better.
It was one of our numerous Wedding vows that the Mrs promised to attend at least two matches a year at Upton Park and until today I was rather nervously looking at fixtures where – sans Andy Carroll – we had a half chance of nicking a point. Flushed with renewed optimism, as I am sure the entire Squad will be, I think I now have a far wider choice of games to choose from. Bloody hell, even the hitherto useless Vaz Te managed to remember where the goal is and netted one. What a day.
It is hard to find any minus points from today’s game which was a deserved win. That Defoe was not sent off ( not for any offence but just for being Judas) is, I suppose, a source of regret but is irrelevant compared to the joy of winning this particular fixture. If you had to win just one game all season this would be it. But after this match (actually our second league win) there are going to be a heck of a lot more three pointers on the way.
*For the avoidance of doubt, the ditties discussed did not include ( for two reasons) "we'll be running round Tottenham with, etc etc,etc."
4219 days ago
It took me 80 minutes to get from Chancery Lane to Upton Park. Boris Johnson I blame you. You knew that there was a fixture at The Academy today almost a year ago. Yet you scheduled repairs across the network today. It was 40 minutes before I got to Bethnal Green at which point I was told that Mile End was closed. Panicked I shared a £15 mini cab to Green Street.
Getting home was an equal mess. The District Line stopped at West Ham and so after waiting 15 minutes to wade through crowds at West Ham it was the Jubilee line to Green Park and a Victoria line to Kings Cross. What a tedious mess. And there were other games in the Capital as well today. Could you not schedule works for four weeks’ time when the football season is over and no-one in their right mind would be heading to Upton Park?
Oh cripes. Jeepers. We did not think of that. Jeepers again.
4262 days ago
It looks as if we will be playing at home in an 80,000 seat Olympic Stadium for 99 years starting in c2016. Like everyone who supports West Ham I have mixed feelings. Green Street may be a shit hole but it is our shit hole.
I shall miss the various cafes where you can have some exceedingly unhealthy food before and after the match. I shall miss the Queen’s dive though it is. I shall even miss my Jamaican barbours. And I shall miss Upton Park. For all its faults it is a ground with atmosphere. I have some very happy memories of the place.
But if we can start to fill the Olympic Stadium West Ham will have the financial muscle to be a Big Club and I know this will sound like heresy to some West Ham Supporters but I’d like to win something now and again. The question is can we fill an 80,000 seat stadium. Right now we sometimes struggle to fill a 34,000 seat stadium. There are c26,000 season ticket holders. If we are serious we need to double that number.
And that means that we need to engage a charismatic manager who can start RIGHT NOW to reach out to the wider community in East London and Essex and who will make a long term commitment to the club. If the contract of fat Sam is renewed in May then we can look forward to three more years of football which does not turn anyone on and three years with a manager who will not be there after 2017. And who does not have the charisma to reach out and get folks signing up for season tickets, etc.
If West Ham is serious about becoming a top six club it has to hire someone NOW ( well in May) who can deliver a seven year plan not only on the park but also in the wider community. There is only one man who can do that and that man is. Paulo di Canio.
4363 days ago
There was something from Sunday’s West Ham match which I forgot to mention showing that the spirit of entrepreneurial genius is alive and well in the East End. Walking back from the ground was a man selling Arsenal loo-paper at £5 a roll. Being a little short sighted it took a whole for me to see why this was not a rip off. Lovingly depicted on each sheet of loo paper was a picture of a different Arsenal player. The entire squad plus Arsene Wenger. I passed on the offer. Of course had it been Spurs loo paper that might have been different.
4364 days ago
Green Street is not only a film (starring the hobbit) about football violence at, ahem West Ham, it is the road that runs alongside the ground. Once every two weeks it is a beery place packed with fat white faces. The rest of the time it is pretty much an ethnic ghetto. I wonder how many of the folks who live there support West Ham. How many of them loathe the club. I don’t know. There is little interaction.
But, having an hour to kill yesterday I interacted and wandered into the “Unisex saloon” for a hair cut. I was the only non afro Caribbean there.
