West Ham United, or known to the fans as, The Hammers, got off to a cracking start to last season. Although they lost their first game of the new season 2-0 to Manchester City, they came back strongly and started to win games.
West Ham's youth academy has always been one of the best around, and they proved that by bringing through more young talent into the first team this past season. Mark Noble was the first, and made some impressive performances in the early part of the year.
But the emergence of another potential fans favourite was the highlight of last season. Fred Sears, after scoring a ridiculous amount of goals for the reserves team, made his debut against Blackburn Rovers. He scored the winner minutes after coming on, fans have since called him "the new Joe Cole."
But that's all last season, what about next season?
Well, West Ham have already taken on a new Financial Director, Gianluca Nani, and Manager Alan Curbishley hopes he will bring great talent to the club. Also, after lots of injuries last season, the manager has what he calls "new signings in their own way" meaning that the likes of Kieron Dyer, Craig Bellamy, Bobby Zamora, and Julien Faubert, are essentialy new signings because they hardly featured last season.
One thing that we can expect from The Hammers next season, is that they will become a more positive side. Last seasons 4-5-1 approach from Mr. Curbishley did not go down to well with the supporters.
Having played with a lone striker for most parts of the season, who goes by the name of Carlton Cole. Who to be fair worked hard but never really came good in the goalscoring department. We can expect to see Craig Bellamy and Dean Ashton feature a lot more together up front than last season.
Others to look out for next season are, James Tomkins, Jack Collison, Tony Stokes. All which had great seasons in the reserves, some even making it into the first team before the close of season.
Could we even see a new manager at some point next season? Bookies aren't taking bets on the new West Ham manager yet, but there could be names mentioned for the job if West Ham don't get off to flying start.
As much as there are injured players coming back and they are like "new signings," most of those injured players are known to get injured for long periods of time, so Alan Curbishley might have to dig into his transfer kitty before too long.
On a final note, West Ham fans shouldn't expect to go storming into a Champions League place, or even a UEFA Cup place. But should see a more fluent and attacking West Ham United than last season.
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4 months ago
It's good for them that Ashton has signed on but they need to keep fit...they will need a fiery character who can charge up the whole team..I think Noble needs to step up...Curbs,is a good overall manager..I wish them the best,with luck they might get to the UEFA Cup spots.
Thanks for Sharing,Robin..
SS
3 months ago
A lot of their season depends on their injury list, I feel. If the Irons get ravaged and lose Dyer, Faubert, Bellamy, etc. for large parts of the season again, I think I can confidently predict another year of negative, conservative, uninspired play and an unremarkable mid-table position. If their key players can stay on the pitch and off of the training table, a UEFA Cup spot wouldn't be out of the question. Here's to hoping Noble, Tomkins, and Sears all continue their development with the first-choice team.
3 months ago
Let's pray Slaven is coming in, and with him a few of the quality names Nani has been linked to.
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