What I think about when I think about West Ham

One of football’s darker moments in 2012 was Fabrice Muamba’s near-death experience on the turf of White Hart Lane. The term “puts football into perspective” was so over-used, it was quickly rendered meaningless. Of course, football was not put into perspective.  If it had been, we would have averted our eyes from the following days’ action; but we didn’t. I don’t know about you, but three days later I was watching a 1-1 draw against Middlesbrough. Only the loss of someone close to you has the ability to put football “into perspective”. Only that agony can make the prospect of watching your team seem not only inappropriate, but quite repugnant.

With time on my hands over the last few days to contemplate this, I considered my relationship with West Ham, a football team that I claim to “love”. There was no question of me attending Saturday’s match against Everton. I would spend the day with my family, not with 35,000 strangers. I was even indifferent to the result. And yet I still wanted to know the result. This apparent indifference to the horror that had befallen me and my family pricked my conscience for a moment, before I happened upon a truth that I had always suspected: West Ham’s chief role in my life is that of a distraction.

A nihilist would tell me that everything in my life, not just West Ham, is a meaningless distraction to pass the time between birth and death; but the futility of supporting a football team seems to make this pastime particularly psychotic. After all, this is the sport where Manchester United fans are dismissed as “glory hunters”. If the rest of us are not in it for maximum pleasure, what exactly are we in it for? Why at least once a fortnight do I find myself in a part of east London I would never otherwise frequent? Why last month did I make a 600-mile round trip to Newcastle? Did the fact that we won the game make that trip any more worthwhile?

Football – especially football in the 21^st century – is the ultimate distraction. My iPhone allows me to retreat from the real world at the press of a button, whether it’s by reading about Mohamed Diame’s injury on the internet, a fellow fan’s opinion of the referee on Twitter or the odds of Kevin Nolan being first goalscorer on Betfair. You could quite easily fill your life with nothing but football. I do not doubt that a significant number of neanderthals at Upton Park and every other ground in the country do exactly that.

And yet, I am a well-educated person who does not want for alternative ways of spending his time. So what is it that has been drawing me back to Upton Park since 1989? Why during a time of despair do I still reach for the remote control to check the result against Everton? Because West Ham is my distraction. For others it’s trainspotting, the novels of Douglas Adams, rambling, alcohol, Radio 4, eBay, line dancing, boxsets, crystal meth, caravan holidays. For me it’s a football team that my dad took me to see for the first time in 1989 – a futile 1-0 win against Luton Town, en route to the first of four relegations in my lifetime.

My distraction has many benefits. I see my dad at least once a fortnight. I am ok at making small talk with fellow football fans, whether it’s while making a cup of tea at work or being introduced to the new boyfriend of my wife’s mate. It has also brought me genuine moments of euphoria which few other things in life can: celebrating on the Upton Park turf after beating Cambridge United in 1993; watching John Hartson’s mazy dribble and goal level the score in a 1998 FA Cup quarter final against Arsenal; wandering through a park in Munich in 2003 reading a text message from my dad which tells me that Paolo Di Canio scored and we have beaten Chelsea; witnessing a Carlos Tevez-inspired 3-0 win at Wigan in 2007; walking home in the snow after a 4-0 thrashing of Manchester United in 2010; visiting Wembley for the first time to see Ricardo Vaz Te’s dramatic goal clinch promotion back to the Premier League.

Each of those moments was shared with either my dad or my brother. They matter, because they brought me joy in a life which, like everyone’s, has its fair share of dark moments. I want to share these experiences with my children, and for them to care, just as I cared when my dad told me about the time Alvin Martin scored a hat-trick against three different goalkeepers. I smile about those memories during the good times, and allow them to transport me elsewhere during the bad times.

West Ham must act, then hope that others follow

I have spent the last few weeks sulking about an administrative error by West Ham which meant my ticket application for the Tottenham match was never processed. It turns out that our hapless ticket office probably did me a favour. Not because we lost. Away fans must make these trips in hope rather than expectation, and brace themselves for the worst. When I recently embarked on a 600-mile round trip to Newcastle, the victorious outcome was a bonus rather than a prerequisite. No, what I spared myself on Sunday was the discomfort of having the moronic thoughts of my fellow fans rammed down my throat.

As with the possibility of defeat, it would have been naïve of me to have gone to the match thinking that I would avoid any anti-Semitic chanting. Ever since I have been attending West Ham-Tottenham matches, chants about “fucking Jews” and mimicking the noise of gas chambers have been commonplace. By commonplace, I mean that it happens at every one of these fixtures, not that a large number of fans take part. Any West Ham supporter who claims to be shocked by Sunday’s events betrays the fact that they haven’t attended many West Ham derbies. I’ve never heard anyone specifically refer to Hitler – as it appears 100-200 fans did on Sunday – but if you’re asking me whether amongst a sample of some 3,000 fans I am surprised that a minority would say something as moronic as "Adolf Hitler, he's coming for you", then no I’m not.

The Daily Mail were first to draw attention to, and condemn, the Hitler references. It’s good to see that a newspaper which supported Hitler when he was alive, has finally seen the error of its ways. Lots of words have been used to describe this behaviour: vile; disgraceful; despicable; abhorrent. But what defence do we have to these descriptions? None. More to the point, why would we even want to defend these morons?

I remember being in the away end at Elland Road in 2005, when a bunch of neanderthals in the row in front of me sang this:

            When West Ham win and Tottenham lose

            We’ll all be gassing the Jews

I cannot put into words how disgusted that made me feel, and how upset I was that another human being, West Ham fan or not, could actually refer to the killing of six million human beings in such a flippant, even gleeful way. I didn’t want West Ham to score after that. I couldn’t bear to see these scumbags derive any pleasure from the match. I just wanted the game to be over.

The club has already come out and threatened those involved with Sunday's chanting with life bans. It’s good to see them acting so quickly. Personally, I would have no objection to a life ban for anyone found mimicking a gas chamber. Good riddance.

The media is already full of vitriol. I would expect this story to run for some time. Worryingly, this is being painted as a problem specific to West Ham fans. This is an unhelpful way of viewing the situation, ignoring as it does a very important truth: a significant minority of football fans across the country hold very sick views and see the football ground as the platform to voice them.

Tottenham fans themselves have a steep hill to climb before they reach the moral high ground. It is they who regularly wished death upon Sol Campbell, whether by AIDS or “hanging from a tree”. Is that better or worse than singing “Can we stab you every week”? Does it matter? Isn’t it all just different shades of the same sick mentality?

Do I think Tottenham fans are any worse than most? Of course not. Millwall fans sing about Leeds fans being stabbed to death. Leeds fans sing about Man United players dying in a plane crash. Man United fans sing about 96 Liverpool fans being crushed to death. Liverpool fans sing this:

            There’s only one Harold Shipman

            The Scousers give thanks

            ‘Cos he only kills Mancs

            Walking in a Shipman wonderland

Last season, Nottingham Forest fans were appalled that their neighbours Derby County would be so sick as to poke fun at the death of their owner, Nigel Doughty. He who is without sin, boys. Is it any less acceptable than singing to Leicester City fans: “You’re just a town full of pakis”?

And on it goes right down to League Two. My local team as a child was Gillingham. A less offensive club you will struggle to find (in 2010/11, there were 326 banning orders in League Two, only one of which related to Gillingham). But what was their fans’ reaction when in 1998 Fulham fan Matthew Fox died at a match at the Priestfield Stadium following a fight outside the ground? This charming song:

            Who’s that lying on the alleyway?

            Who’s that lying on the floor?

Its Matthew Fox and he ain't very pleased
Cos he ain't going to Fulham anymore

I was 15 when I stood on a Craven Cottage terrace surrounded by grown men singing that. You’ll forgive me if very little shocks me anymore.

This is the sole aim of many fans: to wind up the opposition. At any cost. The subject matter may change, but it’s all variations on the same theme. Does anyone really think these anti-Semitic comments were considered opinions from the West Ham fans? Was it a message about Israel’s aggressive response to rocket attacks from Gaza? Of course not. It was just something to wind up the Tottenham fans. The fact that the topic was so shocking made it all the more appealing. That’s why the Daily Mail’s “history lesson” for West Ham fans today so badly misses the point.

I would be very surprised – and disappointed – if West Ham, part owned by a proud Jew, does not take severe action against Sunday’s perpetrators. This is our opportunity to make a statement. But the media and supporters of other clubs have a role to play in this, too. Put these events in the context of a nationwide problem, and there’s a slight chance we can begin to think of ways to tackle it. Paint it as a West Ham-specific problem, and we remain at square one.

Follow Love In The Time Of Collison @OnWestHam

The pressure's off. Enjoy the fireworks.

Following Saturday’s defeat to Wigan, it was suggested that Roberto Martinez’s men have become West Ham’s bogey team. Three consecutive defeats might appear to give some credence to this view, but two away defeats and one League Cup defeat is not nearly enough information on which to base a trend. A glance back at the previous five matches, in which West Ham were victorious in four of them, should demonstrate that while our bogey team does reside in Lancashire, that team is not Wigan. Bolton have beaten us in each of our last eight meetings. Now that’s what I call a bogey.

If we are to go down the route of analysing historic information – always a limited exercise in an industry with such a high turnover of managers and players – then the lesson we should surely draw is this: matches between West Ham and Wigan have almost no bearing at all on the teams’ destinies.

Our first ever league meeting came in November 2003, with West Ham recording a first victory under Alan Pardew with a convincing 4-0 win. A springboard for promotion? Sadly not. The following season, Wigan came to Upton Park and won 3-1. West Ham went on to secure promotion.

The first six meetings as Premier League opponents saw the away side victorious each time; another example of the haphazard nature of these encounters. The last of these matches saw West Ham record a famous 3-0 win at the then JJB Stadium in a huge six-pointer. The penultimate game of the season appeared to have condemned Wigan to relegation. Instead they recorded an unlikely awayday win at Sheffield United and stayed up on goal difference.

Perhaps the ultimate red herring though, came in the 2010/11 season under Avram Grant. Having won just once in their opening 14 matches, West Ham beat Wigan 3-1 with a convincing performance. The match had been billed as a “save our season game”. So was our season saved? Yeah, right.

You may argue that the team’s underwhelming performance at the weekend is more deserving of analysis than my manipulation of the stats; and you’d probably be right. Still, I couldn’t help but be a little taken aback by KUMB’s match report, which began and ended thus: "West Ham blew the chance of moving into the Champions League spots after going down 2-1 at Wigan this afternoon …West Ham's fine start to the campaign meant today's disappointing reversal shouldn't necessarily cause panic in the ranks."

Too right it shouldn’t cause panic. We’re ninth in the table. It’s not Champions League football or bust. If the season so far is enough to send you into a panic you are either of a very nervous disposition or this is your first season following West Ham.

Anxiety seems to have been caused by our pre-Christmas run-in, which goes a little something like this:

Manchester City (h), Newcastle United (a), Stoke City (h), Tottenham (a), Manchester United (a), Chelsea (h), Liverpool (h), West Brom (a) and Everton (a)

Not an easy set of fixtures, granted, but isn’t the point of our strong start to the season that we can enjoy these games without too much pressure. The bottom three teams – Southampton, Reading and Aston Villa – have won once between them. Even if they each win three of their next nine matches and we win none (which isn’t going to happen) we still needn’t drop into the relegation zone.

Like Big Sam, KUMB have split the season up into phases and recognised the next phase as a rather tough one; but in doing so they have reached an unnecessarily bleak outlook. In the same way that a fireworks vendor doesn’t expect to do much business over the summer, West Ham aren’t expected to notch up many points over the coming weeks. But so long as the seller of explosives does good business during October and November, he should still achieve his targets; and so it is with West Ham. We can afford a lean spell in the run up to Christmas, because we did the business in August, September and October. Dropping three points at Wigan doesn’t undo that.

For what it’s worth, my opinion is that the upcoming games offer enough opportunities to at least hit 20 points before we all sit down for Christmas Top of the Pops: Pards has said himself that Newcastle aren’t their usual selves on Sundays following Europa League Thursdays (which is when we come to town); I believe that West Brom are in a false position and that we may be playing them at the right time; home matches against Everton, Liverpool and Stoke are winnable.

Man City are up first. The last time we entertained Mancini’s men in 2010, we did so by letting them breeze past us to a 3-1 win. It meant we went into the Christmas period with just two wins under our belt. This time around we already have four before we even reach November. It’s a nice position to be in. Let’s enjoy it.

Follow Love In The Time Of Collison @OnWestHam

Sam Allardyce can be West Ham's David Moyes

Good day, sunshine: West Ham fans at Carrow Road

The visit of Sunderland to Upton Park on Saturday offers a chance to reflect on how far and how quickly West Ham have come since Sam Allardyce became manager just 16 months ago. The final match of the pre-Allardyce era was a 3-0 home defeat at the hands of the Mackems. It completed a sorry run of nine games in which just two points – out of a pitiful season total of 33 – had been accumulated. Supporters in the East Stand, long since devoid of hope and pride, marked the occasion with an ironic conga.

The extent of this writer’s disillusionment with the club as a whole at this time is there for all to see in the Notes on a Scandal piece, written just after relegation to the Championship was confirmed. That it remains Love In The Time Of Collison’s most-read article to date suggests that it struck a chord. Still, it was hardly a challenge to encapsulate the mood of fans stretched to breaking point by a season of watching a team “managed” by Avram Grant. In my lifetime, only the 1991/92 and 2009/10 seasons can remotely compare to the disunity, disorganisation and hopelessness of Avram’s annus horribilis.

This was the year of Wayne Bridge’s £90,000-a-week wages, Scott Parker giving the half-time teamtalk, £4m spent on Pablo Barrera, Jonathan Spector employed as a midfielder, Tal Ben Haim employed as a footballer, four team changes guaranteed every week, five-goals-in-eight-games Freddie Piquionne demoted to the wing, Luis Boa Morte the eighth most-used outfield player and, last but not least, a defence built around Captain Unfantastic Matthew Upson partnered by any one of Manuel Da Costa, Danny Gabbidon, James Tomkins or Winston Reid, depending on how the manager felt that day.

Fast forward a year and a half and it feels like we are talking about a different club. Not only did Allardyce have to clear up Avram’s mess, he was also charged with bringing stability to a team that had been managed by four different managers in five years. Promotion was achieved at the first time of asking. Four games into the new season, West Ham are sitting joint fifth, having conceded just once (a feat that only Arsenal can match).

It was around this point in the 2005/06 season, the year of our previous return to the Premier League, that a 4-0 defeat of Aston Villa broke the steely resistance of the fans, who finally began to chant Alan Pardew’s name. Allardyce may have returned West Ham to the top tier at twice the speed of Pards, yet at no stage during the 3-0 defeat of Fulham earlier this month was there ever a sense that “We are West Ham’s claret and blue army” would turn into “Sam Allardyce’s claret and blue army”. Aside from the obvious issue of syllables, Sam Allardyce remains a divisive figure.

Ask fans who follow West Ham round the country for their opinion and I imagine that a record 13 away wins last year, compared to just two the previous season, will prompt a largely favourable response. Indeed, standing amongst some 2,000 fellow supporters at Carrow Road on Saturday, there was no frustration at having made a four-hour round trip to see the team essentially play for a point. Increasingly, there is an “in Sam we trust” ethos, where fans appreciate that while the highs this year may not reach dizzy heights, the low of a relegation battle should be easily avoidable.

Of course, a cursory glance at Twitter after a match like this will indicate that plenty of fans disapprove of Big Sam and are just waiting for him to slip up; but then again, it will also reaffirm that Twitter is predominantly inhabited by self-opinionated idiots. Aside from yours truly (a self-confessed idiot) I don’t think I have ever seen an away supporter tweeting during a game. Singing “Who put the ball in the pikeys’ net? Winston, Winston Reid” is much more fun and, well, supporter-like.

The typical attitude of the West Ham supporter – and I think we’ve established that no such thing exists – remains a respectful admiration for Allardyce’s achievements to date, tinged with frustration that the ball sometimes bypasses the midfield on its way to Carlton, and just a bit of paranoia that the man who celebrated our relegation in 2003 is ultimately here to bring the club down from the inside.

This really should be the point at which we put paranoia and utopian ideals to one side, and embrace someone who has the potential to be the best West Ham manager since John Lyall. I can’t make my fellow fans love Big Sam; but I fear we’re already in danger of taking him for granted. Although I appreciate his super-inflated ego doesn't make it easy to warm to him, this is no different to the self-belief of Pards. As long as that self-confidence is not misplaced, what's wrong with a bit of arrogance?

He has quickly assembled a team so strong that relegation already seems unthinkable.Whereas Avram started Winston Reid (his own signing) in just three Premier League matches, Allardyce immediately realised his potential and is now building a team around him.  Given time and continued investment, he has the potential to be our David Moyes. Why not enjoy the ride? If your perception really is that life under Allardyce is incessant hoofball, then you will obviously feel that there is no ride to enjoy. Oh, well. You'll always have the memories of the pretty football Zola's team used to play.

During this weekend’s match, try to cast your mind back to that 3-0 humiliation in May 2011, at the hands of Allardyce’s mate Steve Bruce, and reflect on just how quickly this club has been turned around. In November, we will head to White Hart Lane with the uncharacteristic feeling that we might just win there; something we last achieved 13 years (or six managers) ago. If that doesn’t make you fall in love with Big Sam, nothing will.

Follow Love In The Time Of Collison @OnWestHam

Why signing Andy Carroll really is too good to be true

Andy Carroll signs for West Ham six years after Carlos Tevez's shock signing

When West Ham fans woke today to the news that Andy Carroll had signed for the club on a one-year loan deal, few would have reflected that it was exactly six years to the day that Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano joined the club. The euphoria amongst fans celebrating the capture of a player signed by Liverpool for £35m less than two years ago, bore an uncanny resemblance to the excitement felt on that same day in 2006.

Back then, jubilant supporters were oblivious to a clause in the contract that would have dire financial consequences for the club. The £25m fine imposed by the FA (on top of the £5m Premier League fine) is a liability that will sit on West Ham’s balance sheet for years to come. But it did not take a great deal of hindsight to reflect that West Ham signing two of the world’s best players had to be too good to be true.

The financial penalties were only half the story. The inability to integrate the Argentinians into the team turned the ninth-place, FA Cup finalists into relegation certainties. Tevez may have worked wonders in the final ten matches of the season, but that was the bare minimum required to undo the disruptive effects of his arrival. It is easy to laugh at Alan Pardew’s folly in selecting Hayden Mullins and Marlon Harewood ahead of the Argies – and perhaps he should have thrown a bit more caution to the wind in the early stages when Mascherano especially failed to hit the ground running – but this was an all-too-common and real tale of big fishes struggling to adapt to life in a small pond.

It is testament to the short-term memory of the football fan that Andy Carroll’s arrival at Upton Park has been met with near universal approval. Admittedly, his signing is very different to that of Tevez and Mascherano. Carroll has been playing in the Premier League for several years, so there should be no need for a bedding-in period. More importantly, he is anything but a square peg in a round hole, having been targeted specifically to fit into Sam Allardyce’s style of play (ie he is there to head in Matt Jarvis’s crosses). But there are still lessons to be learned from the Tevez saga, that give cause for concern.

Firstly, the big-fish-small-pond syndrome still holds true. Carroll may not be of the same ilk as Tevez, but he is still a player who should be playing for a club with greater ambitions than avoiding relegation. Put simply, he should be playing for a top-five team. What’s more, he knows that. He has spent the whole summer trying to resist a move to east London. West Ham and Liverpool reached a deal weeks ago. Had Carroll wanted to be a West Ham player, this deal would have been tied up back in July.

It has taken a preseason of disparaging comments from Brendan Rodgers and a lack of serious interest from any other club – most notably Newcastle, the team he really wants to play for – for him to finally cave. Having committed to paying the player’s £80,000-a-week wages in full, we are now reliant on Carroll to fully embrace life in east London.

Assuming that he does score the goals that merit the £1.5m loan fee and £3m+ wages, his stock will rise back to where it was during his peak at Newcastle, and it seems unlikely that he would choose to stay at West Ham, a club that simply does not have the resources and infrastructure to compete at the top of the Premier League. The woeful defensive display at Swansea last weekend was a worrying reminder of how weak our defensive players are. Carroll has the ability to score plenty of goals, but he can’t keep them out at the other end.

If we are going into this deal happy for Carroll to do a job for us for one season and secure us a place in next year’s Premier League (when the new, more lucrative TV rights kick in) then all well and good, but that really makes this acquisition a sticking plaster, rather than a building block. After years of boom and bust, wouldn’t some stability and steady progression be preferable?

As with the Tevez-Mascherano deal, it is the unknowns that are most scary. The motivations behind the deal are key. We now know that the deal with Kia Joorabchian was made possible because he had aspirations to buy the club and saw this deal as a way of getting a foot in the door. But Terry Brown didn’t want to sell the club to him. Hence, the deal was flawed from the outset.

I cannot state the exact motivations behind this deal, and it is that which worries me. What I do know is that Andy Carroll shares the same agent, Mark Curtis, as Sam Allardyce. Curtis is also the agent of Matt Jarvis, for whom we have just paid £10.5m. He also became the agent of James Tomkins, shortly before he was rewarded with a new, much-improved contract. Read into that what you will.

I wish it were otherwise, but 25 years of supporting West Ham has taught me that if something feels too good to be true, it almost definitely is. A club with £80m debt paying £80,000-a-week wages is too good to be true. In fact, it's not really good at all, is it.

Follow Love In The Time Of Collison @OnWestHam

A different league – 2012/13 preview

Of all the lame straplines that have been bounded about since victory at Wembley in May, there is one that stands out for its sheer crapness: ‘Back Where We Belong’. In a post-Tevez saga world, this misguided sense of entitlement is why many struggle to warm to the modern West Ham. When Sam Allardyce is your manager, generating new reasons for others to dislike you really isn’t necessary. The idea that any one team belongs in the Premier League implies that there are teams who do not belong, which – with the exception of Wigan – is nonsense.

Is Modibo Maiga the new Freddie Kanoute? Is Freddie Kanoute the old Modibo Maiga?

The top flight is not where we belong; it’s where we want to be – and merit will dictate whether we stay there or not. For all last season’s drama, thinking back to points accrued through uninspiring one-goal wins during the cold winter months (games against Coventry, Barnsley and Portsmouth spring to mind), it is hard not to rejoice at the prospect of Chelsea, Arsenal and Spurs, opposition that will be hard to beat, but who guarantee an entertaining contest.

Many fans have been underwhelmed by the preseason transfer activity, but a glance back to the 2005/06 season, when West Ham swiftly progressed from a 6th-place Championship team to ninth place in the Premier League, demonstrates that a host of big-name signings is not an imperative. The only new signings that lined up against Blackburn for the big kick off in August 2005 were Danny Gabbidon, Paul Konchesky and Yossi Benayoun. David Sullivan could make life easier for himself by ceasing to link the club with unrealistic transfer targets such as Fernando Torres and Carlos Tevez.

Key to avoiding getting sucked into the relegation scrap will be hitting the ground running by building on the momentum of the last few weeks of the previous season in which we were defeated just once in the final 21 games. The frustration of visiting teams parking the bus at Upton Park should be a thing of the past, so season-ticket holders will hope that the 11 home wins of last season is a realistic target against stronger, but less cautious opposition.

I am not even going to attempt to guess what the 2012/13 season will bring. While Everton are guaranteed to finish no higher than fifth and no lower than eighth, West Ham’s range would seem to stretch anywhere from eighth to bottom. No other team goes into this season with such immeasurable expectations.

The goalkeepers

I believe we have one of the division’s best reserve goalkeepers; I’m just not sure who he is: Jussi Jääskeläinen or Stephen Henderson? Preseason friendlies suggest that Jussi gets the nod as number one but, given that he spent the second half of last season as a substitute in a team heading towards the Championship, Henderson has reason for encouragement.

Over the last two or three decades, the number one spot has generally been an area of strength for West Ham: Rob Green, David James, Shaka Hislop, Ludek Miklosko, Phil Parkes, etc. It therefore feels strange to go into this season with two keepers who both spent most of last season warming the bench. Henderson’s time at Portsmouth suggests he is a good prospect who may be eased into the team over the next season or two, while Jussi is still an experienced, safe pair of hands, even if he is not exactly enjoying his heyday.

The defenders

For James Tomkins – who may or may not be used as a defender – the 2012/13 season is pivotal for his career. A brilliant season in the Championship led to rumours of interest from Tottenham and Newcastle. Fans take his presence in the starting 11 as a given, but those with slightly longer memories will remember just how much he struggled at this level, especially during the 2009/10 season under Gianfranco Zola. His half-time substitution during the disastrous 3-1 defeat to Wolves is a reminder of how strong he was to recover from that nadir, but also a warning against complacency.

The full-back positions remain the squad’s biggest weakness. Big Sam knows his stats better than I do, and perhaps this is just not a priority for him. By contrast, I remember only too well our last hapless season in the Premier League. I am loath to use Lars Jacobsen, Julien Faubert, Herita Ilunga, Wayne Bridge and Tal Ben Haim as scapegoats, but they weren’t the best, were they? Macca has performed well for us at this level before and deserves his chance, but I do worry about how he will fair against the top teams. Guy Demel, meanwhile, can be summed up in one word: liability.

With the exception of Julian Dicks and Tony Cottee, I have never been so happy at the return of a player as that of James Collins. Welcome home.

James Collins experiments with hair

The midfielders

Kevin Nolan, Mark Noble, Gary O’Neil, Jack Collison, Alou Diarra, Mohamed Diame, not to mention James Tomkins. I don’t know about you, but I reckon we’re sorted for centre midfielders. Matt Taylor and RVT should provide the width. I think that covers it.

The forwards

We have the best forwards in this division by a country mile. What’s that? We’re not in the Championship anymore? Oh.

For many fans who spent last season watching poor Carlton chase lost causes and high balls launched from our penalty box, the prospect of a repeat this year may feel like too much to bear. Still, it worked. Just. And having reached double figures for the last four years, I for one believe Carlton – my favourite of all the Coles – is a big asset.

I’m not going to pretend to know the first thing about new recruit Modibo Maiga, aside from a five-minute YouTube clip I saw, in which he scored lots of Ligue 1 goals. Hopefully, he’ll be the next Freddie Kanoute – one that doesn’t piss off to Spurs.

Sam Baldock’s omission from the squad that travelled to Portugal this weekend suggests that his West Ham career is over. A 50% goal ratio belied the fact that he never really convinced. Nicky Maynard simply wasn’t given the chance. Like Baldock, he didn’t seem an obvious Allardycian signing (a ‘wardrobe’ he is not) and it remains to be seen exactly how Big Sam would incorporate him into his system.

And don’t write off Brian Montenegro. You already have? Oh, ok.

The gaffer

I love Big Sam. There – I’ve said it. I don’t like it when he uses the word ‘deluded’ to describe our supporters and sometimes his style of play makes my eyes bleed – but in a way that Alan Pardew and Alan Curbishley had prepared me for. But last season, for every goalless draw with Bristol City, there was a 4+ goal hiding of Watford, or Forest, or Blackpool, or Barnsley, or Brighton.

Most of Zola’s tenure and all of Avram Grant’s was nothing short of a humiliation. Zola used to laugh in post-match interviews when we had just lost. Allardyce has brought back pride to this club. I have no desire to become a Millwall-esqe no-one-likes-us club, but if this season we find ourselves on the end of negative comments from the opposition, it will mean one thing – we’re winning matches.

Irons.

Follow Love In The Time Of Collison @OnWestHam

Twitter is the perfect platform for making yourself look a Wally

Wally Downes in Dresden earlier this week

In February 1945, with Germany all but defeated and just weeks away from surrender, British and American bombers embarked on a revenge attack on Dresden, a town that held no strategic value. In the words of Andrew Marr in The Making of Modern Britain, Bomber Harris and friends "returned again and again with massive fleets, creating a firestorm in Germany's seventh largest town ... burning or blowing to pieces up to 100,000 people".

Even if you do share the less sympathetic views of the right-wing historian Max Hastings who in All Hell Let Loose: The World at War 1939-1945 argues that this huge loss of civilian life was "a price they had to pay for the horrors they unleashed upon Western civilization", to actually take pride in this slaughter of innocent women and children is quite another thing.

It was, therefore, with some disappointment this week that I read a rather tasteless tweet from first team coach, Wally Downes, who is currently in Dresden on a preason tour with the rest of the West Ham squad. While Matt Taylor and Gary O'Neil used the medium of Twitter to communicate their enjoyment at being in one of Germany's most beautiful towns, Wally talked of his "air of superiority after the glorious but necessary 2 victories against facishm [sic]". I won't bother to retype the hashtag.

Given that Wally cannot even spell fascism, I doubt that his views on WWII are informed by any extensive research of the subject, so deconstructing his tweet seems about as worthwhile as trying to persuade a Daily Mail reader of the benefits of immigration.

The beauty of Twitter is that you can unfollow anyone at anytime and spare yourself the self-imposed task of being offended by their views. Don’t like someone? Then don’t follow them. But what a pity that someone who plays such a prominent role in our great club, and who has so much genuine and relevant experience to share, chooses instead to write incoherent nonsense about a country whose inhabitants will – based on my experience of Germany – be acting as the perfect hosts to him and his colleagues.

Sam Allardyce and players meet the Mayor of Dresden Dirk Hilbert in Germany on Wednesday

On Tuesday, the Premier League issued new guidelines on the use of social media. It appears to focus predominantly on issues like endorsement of brands and disclosing team selection. Perhaps it is taken for granted that most players and coaching staff are sensible enough to recognise that certain subjects are off limits.

At the very least, these guidelines are a necessary reminder that whether they like it or not, anyone involved in Premier League football is an ambassador for their club. Wally Downes has 3,000 followers because he is the coach of West Ham, not because people want to hear his views on fascism. Wally is entitled to whatever opinions he likes, but Twitter is not the platform to air them.

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The past was yours but the future's mine

Harry advises Joe: "Life is hard enough when you belong here".

A month has now passed since West Ham confirmed their return to the Premier League and in that time the press have linked us with no fewer than 50 different players. The list includes a couple of Arsenal goalkeepers, several Senegalese players and half the Wolves team. It also includes five ex-Hammers. Certain names have stirred much excitement amongst some fans. As someone who would prefer that one of his favourite bands, The Stone Roses, had resisted the temptation of a comeback tour, there is no sentimental side to me that longs for the return of any ex-players.

I assume that the majority of supporters are united in an aversion to Nigel Reo-Coker ever wearing claret and blue again (unless he finally finds his natural level and signs for Scunthorpe). I for one am about as keen to see the Luftwaffe return to the East End as I am Mr Mediocre. According to the Daily Mail, Sam Allardyce is a fan of NRC but the club are put off by his £40,000-a-week wages. I am put off by the fact that he spent his last year at the club sulking like a baby.

Yossi Benayoun has also attracted some attention. He has been a bit-part player at several clubs since he left Upton Park in 2007. At the age of 32, I fear that a player whose greatest asset was his movement no longer has a great deal to offer.

Of those players rumoured to be on the verge of an Upton Park return, the one I would welcome back is James Collins. Collins was the unsung hero in 2007’s ‘Greatest Escape’ team and it is unsurprising that he has been a success at Aston Villa. Given that George McCartney is a Sunderland player again, I would have no objections to him returning for a third time, though possibly as back up rather than first-choice left back.

Injuries may have played their part, but Joe Cole has never come close to fulfilling the potential he had as a teenager. A decent season at Lille gives hope that he may yet resurrect his career but for Paddington-born Cole, now in his thirties, time is against him. The reality is that a return to West Ham just under ten years after he left would be seen as an admission of failure. West Ham may have a special place in his heart - in his autobiography Fat Frank contrasted his own contemptuous feelings towards West Ham with those of his then teammate - but Joey is a West End boy who supported Chelsea as a kid, and a return to E13 would not be the romantic homecoming for him that it would be for some supporters.

And yet I know that my opposition to the return of Joey probably puts me in a minority. My attitude to sentimental returns was recently summed up by Roberto Di Matteo who, when asked whether he would consider going back to West Brom, said: “In my life, I've gone back to an ex-girlfriend and it didn't work out.” On both levels, I can relate to Di Matteo on this one.

Of course, that’s not to say comebacks never work. Julian Dicks and Tony Cottee both had brilliant second spells with the club. But it’s worth questioning what motivates fans who long for Joe Cole to be back in claret and blue. My suspicion is that such fans yearn for the past and have never fully come to terms with the fact that a squad that in 2001 contained Frank Lampard, Joe Cole, Jermaine Defoe, Michael Carrick and Glen Johnson, three years later comprised Adam Nowland, Neil Mellor, Kevin Horlock, Brian Deane and Wayne Quinn.

In a footballing context, it was a tragedy and what Glen Roeder did to this club should never be forgotten. It should also not be forgotten that Joe Cole publicly backed Roeder to be West Ham manager in 2001. I am not suggesting holding a grudge against a then young man who simply gave his opinion (albeit an incredibly poor one), but when things did inevitably go wrong, Cole was able to move on to better things. It’s you and I who out of blind loyalty made do with Championship football rather than Champions League football.

A mercifully brief spell in the Championship is behind us, and now is the time for optimism where we look forward, not backwards. Some things - like Mancunian indie bands who had one good album 20 years ago - belong to the past.

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An open letter to the Daily Mirror

Dear Steve Stammers

This is an open letter to you in response to your open letter to Sam Allardyce. I doubt you’ll read it, but then I again I doubt Big Sam will read yours.

Please see below my comments in blue. Your sage words are in italics.

It's time to add finesse to the steel: An open letter to West Ham manager Sam Allardyce

There's one way to get the West Ham fans on side - and that's by playing football

I think it’s already been established that Allardyce is about as interested in getting the fans “on side” as he is with being Facebook friends with Steve Kean. If there was any doubt, then I think him calling us “deluded” ended the ambiguity. But, anyway, do go on ...

Dear Sam.

Congratulations on taking West Ham back among the elite. But without wishing to rain on anybody's parade or sound in any way churlish, that is only half the job done.

Churlish? Not at all.

Victory against a decent but limited Blackpool outfit on a scorching hot day at Wembley is one matter. That has ensured an immediate return to the Premier League and the Upton Park fans will be delighted at that achievement. But adjustments now have to be made.

Was it scorching hot? Is that relevant?

Winning football through the harsh and demanding world of the Championship was necessary. And as Kevin Nolan pointed out to the Sunday Mirror with two months left of the campaign, it's sometimes necessary, in the cluttered fixture list of the second tier, to win ugly.

Uh huh.

Physical power and endurance were crucial qualities in that division. Now you might consider adding more finesse.

Yeah we’re in the Premier League now – sod power and endurance. You might need power to combat powerhouses like Jonathan Stead, Craig Mackail-Smith and Zavon Hines, but quite frankly Yaya Toure and co are mere lightweights.

As for endurance - Against Doncaster? Yes. Against Coventry? Definitely. Against Manchester United? Not so much.

The West Ham crowd can be passionate and when the team is playing the brand of football that blends aggression with subtlety, there is no better crowd to be behind you.

Yes, before you turned up Sam, Upton Park was a fortress. Those 5-yard sideward passes under Avram used to have us in raptures. Ok well maybe not under Avram, but we used to go wild for Zola. Perhaps not, but we used to chant Pards’s name all the time. Or at least when he got us to an FA Cup final. Er, Roeder … ?

This, after all, is a club where the likes of Billy Bonds was idolised as much as Trevor Brooking.

Ah, the old Billy Bonds chestnut. You forgot to mention Bobby Moore. Tell him about Bobby Moore. And 1966 and all that stuff. Has anyone told him about the West Ham way?

But there has to be a balance - and as a manager, there was proof that your teams is [sic] capable of striking that balance last season. Just remember Birmingham.

Eh?

In that match, towards the end of the season, you will not need reminding that West Ham were trailing 3-1 at half-time at Upton Park and the fans were not slow in letting you and the team know at half-time that they were less than impressed.

Er, yeah we booed our own players off the pitch. We’re all very proud of that.

Come the second half, and it was a different matter. West Ham passed with precision but played with passion. The blend was perfect and although West ham came back to 3-3, they might easily have won such was their dominance. Birmingham were outclassed and that result provided the momentum for the remainder of the season.

“West Ham dominated the second half but most of their attacking was predictable”. The Guardian

So it can be done.

What can be done? Oh yeah, precision and passion? No we’ve established that's nonsense.

There is one way to silence the "we're West ham we play in [sic] the floor" songs. And that is to replicate the form of the last month of the season.

This song was sung during the 4-0 win at Barnsley in April (the last month of the season). What's your feedback for Sam on this game?

Of course there is a place for a no-nonsense approach at times and survival next season is paramount.

So a no-nonsense approach is only necessary if we want to avoid relegation? Ok, I’m undecided.

But so is keeping the West Ham crowd on-side and if that second 45 minutes against Birmingham is a blueprint, then you will achieve that. In football, reputations are easy to earn and hard to lose. No-one doubts your teams can play and Blackburn will be cursing the fact that you were released and Steve Kean was brought in as a sub-standard replacement.

No, that 45 minutes against Birmingham is not a blueprint. 6-0 against Brighton is a blueprint. 4-0 against Watford. 4-0 against Barnsley. 4-0 against Blackpool. 4-1 against Blackpool. 4-1 against Nottingham Forest. 3-0 against Cardiff. Why do you keep harping on about a 45 minutes against Birmingham in which we continually lumped the ball up to Carlton Cole’s head? Was this the only match you saw last season? Were you awake during it?

But just a sprinkling more football and a tad less reliance on power and the crowd will be with you.

A sprinkling more football and a tad less reliance on power. And that, ladies and gentleman, is all you need to know about football. And to think of all those hours Allardyce spends studying stats. Dickhead.

They are certainly not one to have against you.

Thanks Steve for explaining to our manager just how simple it all could be. How about this for next week's column: 'Syria: why the government and the opposition just need to get along.'

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Where did it all go right? - 2011/12 review

Turning point: Fans witness a 3-0 defeat against Reading in December

In my review of the 2010/11 season, I used the image of Avram Grant losing a blank notebook to the wind of the Etihad Stadium as a symbol of a rudderless and doomed campaign. The topsy-turvy 2011/12 season does not lend itself quite so neatly to such metaphors. One Arsenal fan described his team’s season as “bipolar”, and while I am loth to compare a season that ended in promotion to a disorder, it was certainly a year of extremes and uncertainty. Aptly, fans were kept waiting until the dying minutes of the 49th and final match for a dramatic resolution.

For most other supporters in the Championship, regardless of whether they ultimately tasted success or failure, the pattern of their season tended to be quite straightforward. Reading: play-off hangover for the first four months, ruthlessly efficient thereafter. Southampton: quick out of the blocks, stumbled at the halfway point, then recovered. Coventry and Doncaster: barely out of the relegation places all season. There was little ambiguity at either end of the table. 7^th-placed Middlesbrough missed the play offs by five points. 21^st-placed Barnsley avoided relegation by eight points. By contrast, the play-off final victory over Blackpool could not have better encapsulated a season that for West Ham fans was never quite one thing or the other.

An opening 15 minutes in which Blackpool could quite easily have been 3-0 up, was a throwback to the self-destructive mentality demonstrated in too many big Upton Park matches where the players had simply frozen or panicked. 2-0 down within 30 minutes against Birmingham. Reduced to ten men within 18 minutes against Southampton. Turning a one-nil lead against Reading into a 2-1 deficit within the space of a minute. This was not how it was supposed to be under Big Sam.

The response though, was also familiar. The players waited patiently for a chink in Blackpool’s armour and when the chance came, West Ham’s superior class told. Matt Taylor, always a threat in advanced positions, played an inch-perfect pass to Carlton Cole who calmly slotted away his fifteenth goal of the season. It was not by accident that this team finished ten points above its nearest rivals and just three points behind champions Reading.

Blackpool may have portrayed themselves as hard done-by underdogs, but the truth is that before Ricardo Vaz Te’s dramatic winner, both teams came equally close to breaking the impasse. With a bit more luck and accuracy, chances for Carlton Cole, Jack Collison, Kevin Nolan and RVT would have seen West Ham finish off their opponents in the same comprehensive manner they had earlier in the season, not to mention against the likes of Watford (4-0), Nottingham Forest (4-1), Barnsley (4-0) and Brighton (6-0), too. Then again, had Matt Phillips and Stephen Dobbie shown just a little more composure, West Ham could themselves have been on the end of another Ipswich-style rout.

Looking at West Ham’s league placing during the season, it is tempting to counter this portrayal of a season of extremes. On 17 October, we entered the top three and remained there for the rest of the season. Indeed, narrow one-goal wins at Upton Park against the likes of Portsmouth, Peterborough and Coventry did not feel particularly “extreme” at the time. But rarely was one such clinical, workmanlike performance followed by another.

And that’s the point. This was not a season that can be nicely dissected into defined segments of good form and bad form. You simply did not know what to expect from one game to the next. Three consecutive league wins at the turn of the year were followed by that 5-1 hammering at Ipswich. When a run of seven home matches without defeat came to an end, it did so with a 6-0 thrashing of Brighton. When three consecutive games had to be played with ten men, seven points from nine were still accumulated.

Where did it all go right? Or perhaps the question should be, how did it not go wrong? For there were plenty of negatives. The protracted departure and derisory sale price of Scott Parker. The collapse of the Olympic Stadium deal. David Bentley. Sam Allardyce’s attempt to sign Diouf. The mysterious under-utilisation of big-name signings Ravel Morrison. Nicky Maynard and Sam Baldock. Exit from both cups in the first round. John Carew. Watching opponents “park the bus” at Upton Park. Watching our players fail to deal with opponents that “park the bus”. Fans calling for Di Canio. Allardyce calling the fans deluded. A bit too much “long ball”. Exaggerated perceptions amongst opposing fans about “long ball”. Unhelpful generalisations in the media as to West Ham fans’ attitude to “long ball”.

To miss out on automatic promotion by just two points and to go up anyway against that backdrop is a reminder of exactly why Allardyce was employed in the first place. He gets results. He took a team relegated with 33 points, with one point from its last 27, and got them back in the Premier League at the first attempt. He made some very good signings: Kevin Nolan, Ricardo Vaz Te, Matt Taylor, George McCartney, Henri Lansbury, Joey O’Brien. He got the best out of existing players – James Tomkins, Winston Reid, Carlton Cole, Gary O’Neil – whom another manager might have preferred to move on. Somebody more tactically analytical than myself could dedicate thousands of words to deconstructing the tactics that ultimately brought us success. I will sum them up in two words. Job done.

Analysing a year in the Championship sheds little light on what a first season back in the Premier League is likely to bring. Scraping into the play offs in 2005 gave no indication that a top half finish and an FA Cup final appearance awaited. Within days of the final game, the promotion-winning squad was already being disassembled. This is a season that will be remembered for the outcome, rather than how that outcome was achieved.

Did I say that?

Finally, and if only for some comic relief, here are my pre-season predictions from last August.

1. One-nil to the cockney boys. Six one-nil wins by mid-January, then no more. (1/5)
2. Player of the year: Matt Taylor. Were it not for injuries and a bizarre redeployment to defence he may have been in with a shout, but probably not. (1/5)
3. Big Sam to re-write I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles. I reckon he considered it at times but by the time we reached Wembley he was singing Bubbles with the rest of us. (1/5)
4. Millwall hoodoo to be broken. A draw at their place. Victory with ten men at ours. (4/5)
5. Leeds and Ipswich good value for promotion. Peterborough and Derby to be relegated. Hmm. (0/5)
6. The kids to make little impact. Hines and Stanislas left. Sears and Nouble bearly featured. Potts played a couple of games. (4/5)
7. Scott Parker to be gone by end of August; Greeno gone in January. Scotty left. Greeno stayed. (2.5/5)
8. Starting XI for last game vs Hull to have at least five changes from opening game vs Cardiff. Exactly five changes. Out: Ilunga, O’Brien, Parker, Sears, Piquionne. In: Demel, O’Neil, Lansbury, Vaz Te, Cole. (5/5)
9. Sam Brown’s ‘I Feel Good’ to kick in when we score at Upton Park. Announcer Jeremy Nicholas makes it clear in his book Mr Moon Has Left the Stadium that music being played after a goal will never happen. (0/5)
10. Some good awaydays. A club record 13 away wins. (5/5)

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