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West Ham United: Chris Sutton describes 'massive shock' at what he has seen from Hammers
West Ham being involved in a Premier League relegation battle this season is a “massive shock” according to BBC pundit Chris Sutton.
The Hammers spent a period of last season threatening qualification to the Champions League, and made it to the semi-final of the Europa League, despite David Moyes having a small squad that endured an injury crisis in defence.
A summer spend of over £165million [The Athletic, 1 September] brought in the likes of Nayef Aguerd, Maxwel Cornet, Gianluca Scamacca and Lucas Paqueta, yet the Irons face the prospect of being bottom of the table by the time they next play, which Sutton didn’t see coming.
On the Monday Night Club on BBC 5 Live Sutton said (13 March, 40m 50s): “I think that we would have all thought that West Ham, with the money that they’ve spent and their last couple of seasons, that’s a massive shock to see them in a relegation battle.”
Woeful
There have been some brighter spots this year but taken as a whole the entire campaign has been absolutely awful, in isolation let alone in the context of the record spending and the recent success.
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Money appears to be a hinderance to Moyes who clearly does better with a tight-nit squad who know exactly what they are doing and follow the same plan week after week.
The West Ham board have been unwilling to change the manager throughout the struggles so far, apparently out of ambivalence as much as a concerted effort to support him.
But the increasing sense that the players have an issue with Moyes, coupled with the diminishing support from the fans, is putting him on very shaky ground.
While the board are unwilling or unable to do anything about it he will remain, so the onus is on him to do what he has proven unable to for the past eight months, and get a tune out of his expensively-assembled squad.
Nobody is more shocked that the Irons supporters, who not-unreasonably expected far more from this season, but the situation is real and growing in seriousness with every passing game.
And without a significant change on the pitch the shock will become that much greater if West Ham are relegated to the Championship.