Frank McAvennie: West Ham lack squad depth and got punished v Brentford
We’re delighted to welcome former West Ham United striker Frank McAvennie as our exclusive columnist. Each week he’ll be giving his views on the biggest talking points at the London Stadium…
Frank McAvennie believes West Ham will have learnt a lot from their late defeat to Brentford last weekend.
The Irons were beaten 2-1 on home soil by the Bees after a 94th-minute winner from Yoane Wissa.
David Moyes had just two days to prepare his side for the Premier League encounter after the 2-0 Europa League win over Rapid Wien on the Thursday.
McAvennie suggests the Irons still have a long way to go in terms of improving the makeup of the playing staff.
“They’ve not got the biggest squad,” McAvennie told West Ham Zone. “Some of them are not ready. It might be next year that they’re ready but at the moment they’ve not got like-for-like replacements like other teams have got when they bring in players.
“They’ve got decent defenders but they’ve not got a replacement for [Michail] Antonio. You’ve got to change it about but when you’re playing in the Europa League I suppose other teams get used to it. West Ham have not been there. I’m not going to blame that, they didn’t play particularly badly [against Brentford] but maybe it was a lack of confidence and they just switched off for a minute.
“It’s a learning curve – when you don’t concentrate for 93 minutes, you can get punished. I’m a great believer, we used to do it on a daily at West Ham, we’d score goals in the 92nd minute and all that. The game’s not over until the referee blows and I’m not going to name anyone but maybe some thought ‘we’d take the draw and move on’.”
In other West Ham news, the Irons want to sign this 22-year-old La Liga breakout star with a ‘very attractive’ release clause.
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