Why this has to be the turning point in David Moyes and West Ham’s season
Before West Ham United welcomed fellow strugglers Everton to the London Stadium last month, reports emerged that manager David Moyes might be for the chop if they lost to his old team. The Hammers duly won their first Premier League match in eight attempts and Moyes lived to fight another day.
Five games later, having accrued just two more points in the interim, rumours that the club could oust Moyes resurfaced ahead of Saturday’s visit from Nottingham Forest. West Ham responded again, this time with their biggest win of the season: a 4-0 triumph in which all goals came in the last 20 minutes.
It’s tempting to reason that the east London club’s board now know what to do each week: float the idea of Moyes getting sacked and the wins will keep flowing. But the truth is that the cycle of boom and bust is not sustainable and Moyes and Hammers both need the Forest game to be a turning point in the campaign.
Too often in 2022-23 West Ham have taken one step forward and the two steps back. The win over Everton was a case in point. They followed it up with an FA Cup win over Derby but then failed to win any of their next three and slipped into the relegation zone with a 2-0 defeat at Tottenham Hotspur.
This season wasn’t meant to be like this. Consecutive top-seven finishes appeared to herald a new upwardly mobile era under a revitalised Moyes, while a transfer outlay of around £150m on Brazil midfielder Lucas Paqueta, Italy forward Gianluca Scamacca, Ivory Coast winger Maxwel Cornet and Morocco defender Nayef Aguerd promised much.
Instead West Ham have struggled to find consistency away from the Europa League, where they have won eight from eight. By contrast, just six of their 16 wins in all competitions have come in the Premier League, with the result that they have been dragged inexorably towards the bottom of the table.
These are uncertain times in the boardroom, following the passing of co-owner David Gold, and a relegation fight is not helpful. Daniel Kretinsky is said to be ready to exercise an option to increase his 27 per cent stake into majority ownership. But the threat of the drop may cause the Czech billionaire to think twice, or at least generate a debate about the price.
West Ham do not want to sack Moyes. For all their reputation for hard-nosed negotiation, the board have only fired two managers – Slaven Bilic and Manuel Pellegrini – in the last 11 years. Perhaps Saturday was a breakthrough moment and January signing Danny Ings, who scored twice, will prove to be the attacking spearhead they have lacked.
The schedule isn’t about to get any easier, with an FA Cup trip to Manchester United followed by Premier League games against Brighton, Aston Villa and Manchester City either side of a Europa League tie, so it may be now or never if this season is going to go down as a blip rather than the final chapter in Moyes’s time at the club.