David Moyes reveals Mark Noble missed West Ham cup exit with injury
West Ham manager David Moyes has revealed Mark Noble missed the FA Cup defeat to Southampton with an injury, but there is no news on the severity.
The Hammers were eliminated from the FA Cup at the last 16 stage after a 3-1 defeat at St Mary’s, despite the manager naming a strong team and the Saints making ten changes.
But two notable absentees for the London side were captain Mark Noble and defender Aaron Cresswell, with the boss revealing it was injuries that caused them to miss out.
While Moyes explained that he expects Cresswell to be fit for the Liverpool game on Saturday night, there was no update on Noble’s availability just yet.
“They have injuries and it was a blow to miss them tonight,” he said during his post-match press conference.
“He [Cresswell] will be in contention [for the weekend].”
More problems
West Ham have been obliterated by injuries at different points of this season and while Noble hasn’t played much in the league this season, it’s still a blow.
Thomas Soucek’s form has seen a dip recently and it’s possible that with a slight change of system recently Moyes could have looked to lean on the experience of his skipper.
But Noble now unavailable it limits Moyes’ options of what he can do with his team and means that there is little room to manoeuvre when it comes to rotating.
His experience and leadership would be key in a situation such as now, where the Hammers are struggling to close games out and have picked up just one win in their last four games.
Hopefully he won’t be missing for too long and Moyes can look to bring him in if necessary, but as it stands Noble will be about as useful as the fans are as he recovers from injury.
In other West Ham news, West Ham want sign 20y/o striker with 22 goal involvements this summer – report