507 Alex fans saw the worst display of the season in the first half at Upton Park. Four goals in 40 minutes didn’t sum it up at all, as the Hammers should have had 5 or 6. A terrible defensive display was taken advantage of but the 2nd half proved a much bright prospect. At 4 - 0 down Crewe fans feared the worst but a half spirited fight back saw Dean Ashton, mainly, and Steve Jones terrorise the West Ham back line and two top draw finishes from the Derry Dasher Steve Jones proved to make it a nervy ending for the 31,000 West Ham fans. Clayton Ince went off with 5 minutes to go, as Bankole looked on from the away end, and looks in a bad way with a thigh injury. Rookie Stuart Tomlinson did himself credit with one fine save to stop what looked a certain 5th goal for West Ham.
Despite being chewed up and spat out by West Ham the Alex faith kept the singing going for 90 minutes but it didn’t disguise the fact Crewe looked relegation fodder.
The team started as expected…
Ince
Vaughan- Foster - Walker - B.Jones
Hignett - Sorvel - Cochrane - Lunt
Ashton - Jones
The first few minutes of the game were equal with Crewe getting the first attack, a Dean Ashton run and shot from 25 yards went just over the cross bar after the first 30 seconds, but it was West Ham’s first attack that started the game off. Our inadequate defending was showing us up, Zamora was given time and space by Walker to turn and shoot, whilst Walker had plenty of time to just stick his foot in. The shot, from the left of the box, went straight at Ince who parried it out of play for a corner. That corner proved fatal, it was whipped in and Foster allowed Harewood to get ahead of him who nodded it into the net.
Dean Ashton was the only payer coming out of the game with any credit. He caused trouble all night whilst Walker and Foster backed off from Harewood and Zamora all night. Too many times they had a chance to tackle but waited till they turned them inside out before panicking. Hignett down the left was hopeless and, once against, didn’t look arsed what went on. Lunt huffed and puffed but nothing and Vaughan had a good 20 minutes but after that looked as good as Tonkin(On a bad day).
Foster had a free header from a Billy Jones cross but he ducked in mid air as the ball came to him and sent it into row ZZ. So whilst we were on the up, it was only right that we allowed West Ham a goal to settle their nerves. Reo Coker laid it off to Harewood inside the box, Harewood was given the time and space, again, to tee up a shot and fire it into the left corner.
Frankly, West Ham looked like scoring on every attack. Not necessarily because they were a great side, nothing more than just above average for me, but because we were a shambles in the back line. We tried to man mark Harewood and Zamora, but with Premiership brains it always left huge gaps in the middle of the defence - something West Ham took advantage of.
In the 15 minutes before the 3rd goal, West Ham must have had 10 shots on goal. Zamora and Horlock forcing Ince into comfortable saves. More defensive cock ups led to the 3rd goal, Bobby Zamora gave the ball to Reo-Coker just inside the area on the right. The defence backed off, nothing new there, allowing Reo-Coker to fired into the top left corner.
The game was over and for many Alex fans it was a matter of how many we’d concede. West Ham continually came back at us, whilst Ashton tried his best to create anything he could up front. It took only 6 minutes before it was four. Can’t even remember this goal, or any of them for that matter, completely numb at the performance of Crewe. But I do remember Jobi McAnuff being allowed to run from his own half, with the Crewe defence backing off again, and from 20 yards sent a bobbling ball in off the post after 40 minutes.
Might as well have left there and then. 4 hours drive to witness nothing but an inept Crewe side, but most of the fans braved the 2nd half (Though some left). It wouldn’t get any worse in terms of the performance.
Second Half
The remaining Alex fans had got over it and decided to make a joke of the whole thing, might as well whilst the team were doing so. Chants of “We want 5!” seemed to rile the West Ham ‘faithful’. To our right stood about 1,000 West Ham fans who took every look personally. Any noise from the away end was greeted by the, hmmm, w*nker hand motion. It was a sight to see, 1,000 fans waving their hands at you.
One West Ham fan was removed for god knows what. The clever police couldn’t be arsed walking far so took him out via the away end, which saw him wanting to take on ever Alex fan in the ground. Maybe he’s woken up and realised what a prat he looked. Then again, maybe all the West Ham fans to our right woke up and realised what prats they looked in their baseball caps and hooded jumpers trying to look ‘scary’. Been more scare of George from Rainbow (Who isn’t!).
Anyway, we had 5 goals to score. We obviously didn’t score those five goals, but to say we were generally rubbish and West Ham were apparently, according to TalkWestHam (Or is it TalkSport?) and lazy journalists, playing like Brazil - we did quite well.
It was obvious what Dario said, we’d lost it already - just restore some pride. The team came out a tad calmer and more belief. So much that Billy wanted to show off from a corner, yes, he did another ‘Billy Volley’. It flew several miles over the bar. Ah well.
West Ham went back in control, with McAnuff forcing Ince to tip over a 20 yard shot, but one lucky break for Crewe went along way to restore pride. Ashton took the piss out of several West Ham players, they felt disillusioned so tried to claim a foul on the half way line. Ashton carried on and toe poked a beautiful ball down the middle for Steve Jones to run onto.
Thomas Repka was so deep he was virtually in the stands, so he kept Jonah on who went running free on goal before sliding it under the keeper from the edge of the box. Repka was booked for being a tw*t to the linesman.
“5-4, we’re going to win 5-4.”
It should have been 5-1 within minutes but Bobby Zamora treated fans to one of the misses of the season. Reo Coker got behind Vaughan and fired it across the face of the goal. It beat Ince and Zamora was running onto it and from 4 yards was needed to tap it in, but he had other ideas and sliced it out wide for a goal kick. He he.
We were becoming bright, Billy Jones went off for McCready and the woeful Hignett went off for Tonkin - Vaughan moving into the midfield.
So with 20 minutes left we made it a nervy ending for West Ham. McCready sent the ball behind the West Ham defence who allowed Steve Jones to run onto it. The goal keeper came rushing out but Jonah dinked it past him, it looked as if Jonah had gone too far and was virtually on the by line. Calls were for him to cross it for Dean Ashton but Jonah just tapped the ball down the line and somehow it spun in off the post. 4-2.
By now you were thinking, maybe… just maybe.
The last 20 minutes seemed to calm down with West Ham cruising. Only two chances fell our way. Both came from McCready crosses to Ashton. One was a long cross down the centre into the penalty area, both Dean Ashton and the keeper went up for the ball but Ashton was late in trying to toe poke it past the keeper and Baywater collected.
Then in the last 5 minutes a cross from McCready was volleyed from 6 yards only for the keeper to save it, albeit with a bit of dodgey-ness.
A big downer on the match was when Clayton Ince was stretchered off. A Foster back pass forced Ince into a quick clearance, his kick saw him collapse to the floor and the stretcher was needed. Rookie keeper Stuart Tomlinson was given his 2nd appearance in his short career.
The 19 year old save us from more embarrassment aswell. Most notabley when Chris Cohen hit a volley which looked to be heading the for the far right corner but Tommo went full stretch to punch the ball out for a corner. Superb save. Then quick reactions saw him get down low to stop Brian Deane’s hard shot from making it 5-1.
Full Time
I think this match report makes us look good, but believe me we weren’t. At half time I think Wimbledon looked like having more chance of staying up. We need 10 points from 10 games to assure safety. At this moment I can’t see it happening and I can see us going down, or at least needing a last couple of weeks fight.
The defence is as shoddy as it was 2 years ago, the midfield lacks a back bone. We need a leader - Brammer for instance. The attack is the only positive thing in our 11 at the moment. Without Jonah and Ashton, or maybe one of them, we’d be below Bradford by now.
Dario says he doesn’t like to mess with the starting line up too much but to save us from going down he HAS TO. My line up would be:
Ince
RB: McCready
Foster
Moses
LB: Tonkin
MR: Lunt
Cochrane
Billy
ML: Vaughan
Ashton
Jones
But for now, the player rating……..
Ince - 6 - Couldn’t do much about any goals. Other than that, nothing to do.
Billy - 7 - Probably our best defender. Got tackles in and with no help from Hignett cut out a lot of McAnuffs stuff.
Foster - 5 - Backing off, not getting stuck in. Did he make a tackle? Doubt it.
Walker - 4 - Even worse than Foster
Vaughan - 6 - A decent first twenty minutes but soon after was as poor as Foster and Walker. Allowed the Hammers to get behind him too many times.
Lunt - 6 - Poor. Unhelpful.
Cochrane - 6 - Huffed and puffed. Got stuck in and tried to provide for the front two. Half decent.
Sorvel - 7 - Maybe our best midfield. Good passing, got a few tackles in and looked slightly more interested than Hignett.
Hignett - 3 - Laughable. Poor passing at times, didn’t looked arsed. Didn’t help out defensively either.
Ashton - 8 - Rattled the West Ham defence when he had the ball. Provider of all the opportunities.
Jones - 7 - Scared the West Ham defence without creating much but the two goals and his 2nd finish (Fantastic!) gets him a 7.