West Ham United 2014-15 Big Sam, Andy Carroll, Attractive Football, What could go wrong?

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Cellar-Door

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Oh that's right EVERYTHING like always.
 
A club mandate for more attractive football while retaining a manager who has a long career of winning ugly.
 
Andy Carroll out up to 4 months
http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/28471772
 
Enner Valencia's work permit still hasn't gone through.
 
Winston Reid won't sign an extension.
 
Big Sam wants Ravel Morrison gone, the board doesn't.
 
 
So you know, the usual.
 

soxfan121

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fletcherpost said:
 
Did you guys work on that one at the training ground. It was as if Soxfan knew you were gonna make that run.
 
Sometimes you just need the faith that someone will get on the end of a great through ball. 
 
Steamer finished it professionally, we briefly hugged and then we trudged back to the circle.
 

Cellar-Door

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Hey, the work permit went through, and we got Jenkinson on loan from the Arse a player about whom the phrase.. "he's not that bad" is often used.
 
Of course mercurial attacking player Ravel Morrison got himself arrested for allegedly punching his ex-girlfriend and/or her mother.
 
This is why nobody should go to Manchester. Nothing good has ever happened there.
 

Cellar-Door

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Well a loss to Spurs who we swept last season, and big summer attacking signing Zarate sits on the bench while the Corpse of Carlton Cole and Ricardo Vaz Te get the start.
 
Sam is going to be fired in a month or less at this rate.
 

Cellar-Door

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Hooray we won a thing!
Zarate looked dangerous still started Cole, but Palace let him score for the first time in 6 months which was generous of them.
 

Cellar-Door

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Talking to myself in this thread but.....
 
This team is good. Also really fun to watch. Sakho has 6 in 6, Valencia heating up, tons of pace and athleticism.
Holding on to Alex Song might be tough, but this is legit top 10 squad.
 

PedroSpecialK

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Valencia and Diafra Sakho for a combined £16.5m was a great piece of business for Allardici. Still think they could have kept Diamé but they've looked much better overall this season.
 

Cellar-Door

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PedroSpecialK said:
Valencia and Diafra Sakho for a combined £16.5m was a great piece of business for Allardici. Still think they could have kept Diamé but they've looked much better overall this season.
Diame was a combination of wages, making a nice profit on the sale, his contract running down and no place to play him. He couldn't win a consistent spot last year and this year's team is much deeper. I like him, but I don't see where he'd play for us. Song, Noble, Nolan, Kouyate,Downing, in some combination is the starters and first sub with Jarvis, Morrison, Amalfitano and Poyet for depth.
Diame only wants to play in the middle, so I'd much rather have what we have now, and the money from Diame went toward Sahko and/or Valencia which was a much bigger need.
 

ChipperBo

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Diame was a combination of wages, making a nice profit on the sale, his contract running down and no place to play him. He couldn't win a consistent spot last year and this year's team is much deeper. I like him, but I don't see where he'd play for us. Song, Noble, Nolan, Kouyate,Downing, in some combination is the starters and first sub with Jarvis, Morrison, Amalfitano and Poyet for depth.
Diame only wants to play in the middle, so I'd much rather have what we have now, and the money from Diame went toward Sahko and/or Valencia which was a much bigger need.
 
Diame was also wildly inconsistent and frequently would just fail to show up for games.  The type of player who could be completely unstoppable on his day but also just dreadful (particularly against the "smaller" teams).  Very frustrating.  Up until he got hurt, Kouyate looked like a much steadier player.  Given that it appears the money they got for Diame went directly to signing Sakho, I think West Ham did quite well to sell him when they did.
 
I've always thought Allardyce was a better manager - particularly tactically - than many give him credit for. He's not as good as he himself sometimes suggests he is, but he really was superb at Bolton, and he seems to finally have the Hammers playing the way he wants them to. (FWIW, I don't think he'd be the worst England manager, either; his skin seems thick enough to inure him from much of the media pressure, and his strengths as a manager seem to dovetail with the requirements of international football.) 
 

Cellar-Door

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Nearly 4 months in still in 5th, and a win tomorrow over Swansea would send us top 4 (Southampton and Manure face off Monday so we'd pass one of them).
Hung around despite injuries to Sakho, Song and Downing. Concern now is African Nations coming up which will likely take Song, Sakho and Kouyate. Also that the medical staff for Senegal is so grossly incompetent that Big Sam wants to send one of the West Ham physios with Sakho and Kouyate so they aren't treated by Senegal's staff.
 

Cellar-Door

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Eric1984 said:
I can't imagine it will. If Liverpool was still in the CL maybe he'd be tempted, but what is the real selling point now? He's talked about his relationship with the WH owners, the WH squad isn't significantly (if any) worse than Liverpool, WH has the better manager, and he gets to live in London instead of a Shithole up North.
 

Blundatola

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Cellar-Door said:
I can't imagine it will. If Liverpool was still in the CL maybe he'd be tempted, but what is the real selling point now? He's talked about his relationship with the WH owners, the WH squad isn't significantly (if any) worse than Liverpool, WH has the better manager, and he gets to live in London instead of a Shithole up North.
 
Wouldn't Liverpool be able to offer more on the wage front?
 

Cellar-Door

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Blundatola said:
 
Wouldn't Liverpool be able to offer more on the wage front?
Maybe? His current deal hasn't been released other than that it runs through the 2018 season, but I'd guess it is between 30 and 50K, Liverpool probably could top out at 60-75k? (Only 4 on their roster make more than that). I doubt they go that high though, their latest offer to Sterling was $70K, makes me think the wage budget is tight.
 

DLew On Roids

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Keep telling yourself that.

There's an order to the world. Liverpool players don't say no to Barcelona or Real. West Ham players don't say no to Liverpool.
 

Cellar-Door

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DLew On Roids said:
Keep telling yourself that.

There's an order to the world. Liverpool players don't say no to Barcelona or Real. West Ham players don't say no to Liverpool.
Gudjohnsen did. Of course we wish he hadn't, but stil....
Actually not many guys go to Liverpool from WH, not sure the reason but they tend to end up in Manchester or cross town at Chelsea or Arsenal.
 

Dummy Hoy

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DLew On Roids said:
Keep telling yourself that.

There's an order to the world. Liverpool players don't say no to Barcelona or Real. West Ham players don't say no to Liverpool.
 
Joking (I assume) or not, this is exactly the arrogance that has people laughing at 'Pool this season.
 

Cellar-Door

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If you can find it watch today's FA cup replay v Everton. Went all the way to keepers taking penalties.
 

soxfan121

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I think you're gonna swipe 7th, CD. Really impressive, confident performance at home vs. Hull today. Fun game, and team, to watch play when they are clicking. 
 

PedroSpecialK

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Some of the olé time stuff was great to watch - the exchange between Amalfitano and Valencia, as well as the sequence leading to Nolan's effort off the bar in particular.
 
I know WHU fans have been touting him all season but it's remarkable how good Alex Song looks in the center of midfield for them.
 

Cellar-Door

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Well, wish I could say that was unexpected.
 
Carroll has been terrific this year, and it will really hurt the depth. Sakho and Valencia are still really good together up top, but after that it gets rough. Makes Abedayor's move getting blocked much more important, he would have been a nice depth piece.
 

sachmoney

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Welp. West Ham fans made that hilarious video of them allowing a black fan on the train to take the piss out of Chelsea, but this also may have happened on the way to Spurs. Disgusting and disappointing. I saw a graphic of the Premier League clubs with the most incidents that I wish I had on hand right now, but I believe Chelsea and West Ham were the top two. Arsenal was up there too. I don't know if it's as big a "problem" as in other countries, but it's certainly one that exists.
 

CodPiece XL

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sachmoney said:
Welp. West Ham fans made that hilarious video of them allowing a black fan on the train to take the piss out of Chelsea, but this also may have happened on the way to Spurs. Disgusting and disappointing. I saw a graphic of the Premier League clubs with the most incidents that I wish I had on hand right now, but I believe Chelsea and West Ham were the top two. Arsenal was up there too. I don't know if it's as big a "problem" as in other countries, but it's certainly one that exists.
 
 
Chelsea have had a bad reputation for years, the Chelsea Headhunters were the worst with links to Combat 18 and the NF. There's more teams than I would care to list that have their fair share of "Ultra" racist factions, it's not just Chelsea and certainly not just England.  Italy, France  Spain and Russia just of the top of my head come to mind.
 

Cellar-Door

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Looking to finish somewhere in the 7-9 range, and Sam might not be offered a new deal.
I'm torn on this. I think Sam is incredibly underrated as a manager who can make a lot of different styles work, even if it is often ugly.
On the other hand, the rumor that Bielsa who I love would be on the list of potential replacements makes me happy.
 

Cellar-Door

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Second half collapse, Carroll not so shockingly among a raft of injuries.
 
Big Sam  is gone.
 
Song almost certainly will not be coming permanently, as he's likely off to City or Chelsea.
 
Jenkinson however seems to be coming back for another year of loan, and Hendrie's transfer goes through.
 
Odds on the new manager put Slaven Bilic (meh) as the frontrunner, with Unai Emery (yes Please) and David Moyes (meh) behind.
The next group includes: Steve McClaren (ugh), Marcelo Bielsa (would be fun), and Roberto Di Matteo (meh)
 

swiftaw

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West Ham got the fair play Europa spot, they'll enter the competition in the first qualifying round which starts on July 2. 
 
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