Julen Lopetegui may have unwittingly provided insight into his team selections and substitutions, which have baffled more than a few West Ham fans recently.
The Hammers’ head coach still seems no closer to knowing his starting eleven than the day he joined. However, perhaps the pressure of the last week has focused his mind on what he is looking for.
It appears that Lopetegui is going to rely on the grafters to get him out of the current predicament, which may go some way to explaining his substitutions today.
His comments on Tomas Soucek were particularly revealing but could have easily applied to his team as a whole. While West Ham didn’t produce great quality against Brentford, there was grit, fight, and determination, which was sorely missing against Chelsea.
Lopetegui said of Soucek: “I think that we need this kind of behaviour in the big matches because this is the Premier League. In the Premier League, you have to play always with eleven players fighting for the team, having this kind of high work rate.”
From those comments, it’s safe to assume that Big Sou will be starting against Ipswich next weekend, but don’t rule out Konstantinos Mavropanos featuring at full back too. As Martin alluded to in his earlier piece, the big Greek didn’t look too shabby at right back and provides the team with extra security and threat from set pieces, along with his obvious physical attributes.
Lopetegui’s emphasis on fight, work rate, and intensity reveals much about the attributes he feels will keep him off the dole queue. So, don’t be surprised if Emerson and Paquetá don’t make the cut for the visit of the Tractor Boys.