It’s all getting a bit ‘previous’ in media – land. West Ham United have landed in a bad run of form against top-six opponents after back – to – back defeats against Chelsea and Liverpool. Julen Lopetegui is under pressure, any manager who cares about his job and his reputation wants to steady the ship and start getting points on the board, just five games into a Premier League competition.
But ‘crisis? and talk of a ‘shortlist of three’ ready to replace Lopetegui? Surely that’s all gossip? Our previous manager had about six separate spells of ‘three games to save his job’ so surely talk of replacing the Catalonian is wildly exaggerated.
It would seem not. TheHardTackle.com even goes so far, after claiming a couple of days ago that Lopetegui had three games to save his job (see what I mean?) – that – and I quote here:
“West Ham United have reportedly compiled a three-manager shortlist featuring three former Chelsea tacticians to identify a replacement for Julen Lopetegui.”
I’m always in two minds about whether to give these ‘reports’ the oxygen of publicity but when I see some of them ‘trending’ I feel a strange responsibility to respond in the sake of balance, lest Hammers fans feel everything in the media is a ‘shock horror sack-him-now’ – type witch hunt.
It isn’t.
Out of curiosity I’m sure you will be interested to know which three ex-Chelsea supremos are supposedly on the ‘shortlist’. Ok, I’ll oblige. And don’t shoot the messenger! The names are- Thomas Tuchel. OK, Don’t agree, but can understand. Available. Decent. Good track record. Two – Graham Potter. Safe pair of hands. Not exciting. Should do Ok. And the third – wait for it – Frank Lampard. BFF at London Stadium? OMDB.*
And you thought we had a divided fan base over concessions? Frank back at West Ham is as conciliatory to some of the fan-base as moving to Milton Keynes and playing in pink green and white. And hopefully, just about as likely.
S0 – satisfactorily dissolving the credibility of their own report by adding the – erm- ‘controversial’ name of Lampard onto this mythical shortlist as a replacement. Indeed.
In any case, I hope Julen Lopetegui gets some serious motivation now from wherever: – Please Jules, get on and start winning, save us from a controversy that would really get the fur flying.
And on a serious note, in the meantime can we calm down and support our team? And our head coach? By all means, criticise, highlight, opine, discuss, but five games in? Replace him? Just. No.
‘United” – Its not just the third word on our badge, it means something.