West Ham Utd 1-0 Swansea City (30/09/17)

[bubbles1966]

If I was a Swansea fan I'd have felt hard done by yesterday.

A swansea fan.

"We have a manager who for some reason is too afraid to have his team attack.I thought he was the business.Park the bus for some other team you feckin coward"

"We have a goalkeeper and 7 defensive players on the pitch along with three attackers who are just waiting for some sort of random opportunity to take a strike at goal."

[Diogenes]

I'm not having this 'we broke Swansea down' mentality.

They completely outplayed us until the tide turned a bit when Lanzini came on.

The only thing they lacked was chance creation but they knocked it round us for fun. If I was a Swansea fan I'd have felt hard done by yesterday.

Really? They had some/more possession but in my opinion never looked dangerous. We were poor, but completely outplayed? Makes them sound like Barcelona. Masuaku and Sakho turned the tide by creating and scoring the winner.

[bubbles1966]

Another Swansea fan

"The first half we were ok, still didn't look like scoring though. Second half we were dreadful, I don't think we created a chance, I thought West Ham were poor but we just look like relegation fodder. "


In short, we had half a team that played to all it's worst characteristics - and we still beat them.

[WorcesterWHU]

Yeah, I stand by thinking that Swansea got what they deserved for their lack of intent - a bit of passing in the middle doesn't mean that they bossed it, especially when their only two real efforts at goal came from outside the box.

Our intent was there; it was our execution that was a mile off. A few subs and that changed, if the goal had been on 70 mins I would've backed us to get at least one more.

[Coops]

Swansea didn't outplay us. They were quite successful in stifling us for most of the game. But then they let one past at the death so their plan to bore us into submission didn't work.

[Ifebbubbles]

Swansea didn't outplay us. They were quite successful in stifling us for most of the game. But then they let one past at the death so their plan to bore us into submission didn't work.

We looked the same yesterday as we have done all season. I dont think its fair to blame that on Swansea.

[S-H]

They held Spurs and Kane to a 0-0 draw, which takes some doing at present.

They have a game plan when playing away from home, stay tight at the back and stifle the opposition, it nearly worked for them yesterday.

That was a good and very important 3 points, under very difficult conditions.

Teams low on confidence, and under huge pressure to win, don't usually go out and play like Barcelona, so just appreciate the win.

[Crouchend_Hammer]

I'm not having this 'we broke Swansea down' mentality.

They completely outplayed us until the tide turned a bit when Lanzini came on.

The only thing they lacked was chance creation but they knocked it round us for fun. If I was a Swansea fan I'd have felt hard done by yesterday.

This is pretty fair. We were lucky Swansea inexplicably decided to go into protect the point mode second half as they were passing around us for fun but just no killer instinct. A bit more intent from them and we woukd have been in trouble
Bony getting injured helped us as well tbf

[Sarfend Hammer]

Yesterday was really disappointing. Swansea played more like a home team than we did in the first half while creating no real chances, in fact the best chance was the one where Antonio bounced it off the ground and Fabianski made a good save. They were dominating the midfield and there was a period where we were having trouble getting the ball up the other end.

Second half we came out with more intent and took the game to them, while also not looking like we were going to score. Antonio was definitely not fit and with Ayew having a poor game we were left with very little in the way of attacking thrust. It was left to Cresswell and Zabaleta to create the chances which made us easy to defend against.

Bilic can be criticized for the team set up and persevering with unfit and out of form players but has to be credited for the positive impact his changes make. The one lingering doubt is how clueless we appeared in the first half, it's like we never trained together all week and had no confidence to hold onto the ball and carry it forward.

I am coming to the conclusion that Chich and Carroll are Plan A and Plan B they can't be part of the same setup. With Lanzini, Antonio, Chicharito, Arnautovic and Sakho we could create a lot more problems than we are able to with Carroll at the moment. I would bring Carroll on as an impact sub or in a game where we expect to be defensive and need someone who can help the defence and provide a target to relieve the pressure.

[Pop Robson]

Was it like the old BFS tactics clean sheet for every away game ?

[WoodgateHammer]

As much as I've been really impressed with Masuaku of late, I've equally been disappointed in Cresswell. He deserves benching.

Interesting that he's in the England squad then, go figure...

[snooperpooper]

Interesting that he's in the England squad then, go figure...

Maybe he's one of the ones Southgate can't believe makes the squad but is left with no choice.

Go figure!

[e-20]

Do we ever not get out played in midfield it's about the only consistency we seem able to grasp.

[Boo Boo]

Interesting that he's in the England squad then, go figure...

Deservedly so?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/201 ... t-deserve/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Sam Wallace (Chief Football Writer) has got his Pochettinos mixed up with his Pellegrinos though.

[Clacton-ammer]

Massive 3 points, proper **** game, are we not entertained....

Booing the subs again, did you melts not remember the last time you booed subs and it turned out that Slav called it right?

I said it last week I think, not sure what we are missing, but we are missing something. There appears to be a lot of dross in the league this season, so that makes us probably mid table, or just below dross, let's hope for a good cup run...

Could be worse, we could be Palace :lol:

[Coops]

Booing the subs again, did you melts not remember the last time you booed subs and it turned out that Slav called it right?

It obviously works then.

[swerley]

I said it last week I think, not sure what we are missing, but we are missing something. There appears to be a lot of dross in the league this season, so that makes us probably mid table, or just below dross, let's hope for a good cup run

As far as missing something, I believe the problems on Saturday were Lanzini not starting (correct call, coming back from injury), Ayew & Hernandez being played out wider when they are clearly not quality there, Antonio obviously not fully fit, and Swansea knowing exactly what we were going to do with starting Carroll.

Kouyate and Noble are not the quickest midfield. Cheik isn't known for playing the killer pass and Mark wasn't forward enough to do so either. Cresswell and Zabs got stifled on the edges throughout the first half especially. Once Mas came on, Cresswell and him teamed up more to push forward.

Couple all that with the fact that Swansea set up away like we used to under Big Sam, and the outcome here was quite predictable. To me, Ayew is a luxury player at this point and should not have started, but then Marko was sick.

[HammerAl]

I'm quite glad we have got the next couple of weeks to recoup and get the injured players back to some sort of fitness level. Lanzini, Antonio and Obiang are so important to us.

[YorksHammer]

Another game where too many attacking moves broke down because of the poor quality passing from Antonio and Kouyate. Especially against a team like Swansea, we need players that are going to keep possession and look for a probing pass - not knock it straight to the opposition. I'm tired of seeing it. No wonder we get absolutely brutalised by a top team with any pace, we practically give them the ball to hurt us on the break. Very lucky that Swansea seemed to forget they had players in our half for most of the game.

I hope we get Obiang back, start him with Noble and Lanzini in front, and play Antonio and Arnautovic around Sakho in the middle. Chicharito is trying but it's just not working out for him - our striker curse hitting again, I think - and Sakho will suit that system down to the ground. Masuaku in for Cresswell all day long based on the performances this season as well.

Workmanlike performance, but take the three points and move on. Get the International break over and some more fitness into those that need it due to recent injuries and hopefully we can move on from there.

I said at the start of September that we should get 6-9 points and cup progress out of the month. We've done it.

[sutts07]

Formation and tactics were always going to be difficult for Slav this week. Playing five at the back has slowly turned our season around but it was fairly easy to predict that we wouldn't need that many at the back against Swansea.

It was a tricky one with regards to Carroll too, he clearly changes our whole dynamic (not for the better) but on the other hand he has a good record against Swansea and in the past they have struggled to cope with him.

I can see why Slav tried 442 and stuck with Carroll up top, but I can't for the life of me understand why he stuck with it for the full 90min. Yes we eventually got the goal we needed but I feel we could have got 2 or 3 had we changed it to 433. Lanzini on for Carroll seemed an obvious early change to me.

You also then have to factor in the delicate situation with Lanzini returning, Arnautovic getting sick and Antonio clearly playing with an injury.

Ultimately you have to hold your hands up and say that Slav got it right, because we won and kept a clean sheet. But I don't think any of us are fooled into believing that was judgement over luck.

One thing for sure, Masuaku has to be pushing for a start now either as a wing back or a winger. His delivery and general positive approach is so refreshing.