It took one swing of Mark Noble’s right foot to tell us what we knew from the last time.
Namely, that the Premier League is as intensely tough and ruthless as it is downright cruel.
Enjoying time on the ball, plenty of possession and attacking the South Bank end, it felt like this Premier League lark wasn’t anything to be scared of after all.
But alas, like a slap in the face with a wet kipper, West Ham went and scored a beautiful goal through Noble – a 20 yard effort you could barely class as a chance, more of as a goal of the month contender.
Then all of a sudden, our earlier chances through a missed SEB header, a Jarvis skyer and a Keogh air shot were immediately elevated from ‘a touch wasteful’ to profligate.
Matt Jarvis - End product wasn't good enough
The fact that Robert Green was West Ham’s best player tells its own story.
Only George Michael in the back of his Range Rover could possibly stink of leather more than Green, such were the shots that were pounding in on him, start of the second half particularly.
I thought we were really encouraging in stages and the shape of the team was spot on.
So it was a shame Noble went and spoilt things, just when we were threatening to lay down an impressive marker.
There were loads of positives. Stephen Ward, assigned the task of shackling the incredibly quick Dyer, looked assured and impressive, and actually caused me to think that the left back slot need not be so problematic this season.
Henry and Milijas were a big plus, paticularly the Serb who looks like he could be a new cult hero in the making, particularly after we saw him winding up his left peg at the start of the second half.
Jarvis, faced against a pretty competent looking Faubert, also suggested that he could impress this season, so long as his final ball is better than it was today.
But as the second half continued, SEB looked more detached from Keogh, Jarvis or anyone else and I started feeling sorry for him as he ploughed a lone furrow in a formation that so obviously doesn’t suit him. He struggled.
And it was he who missed our most guilt edged chance after an hour or so, when we enjoyed a 10 minute purple patch.
After we’d conceded from a corner that Hennessey surely had to come and catch, we looked a bit ragged and stretched, which was to be expected, particularly when Sylvan hobbled off near the end.
Basically, if you weren’t at the game today and want more about how we played, then I reckon you should just close your eyes and think about how you thought it would be…You’ll get closer to it than reading my ramblings.
Loads of endeavour, loads of heart and a load of passion that fills you with pride. But predictably, there’s that niggling sense of regret that you’re watching a team that is not quite as prepared as you thought it would be.
Tom’s Player Ratings
Here’s Tom’s player-by-player rundown of Saturday’s performance:
Wayne Hennessy
7/10 – Made some good blocks and fielded and kicked well as usual. There’s still that question mark over whether he commands his area as well as he could and it looked like he could have come for the cross for that second goal.
Kevin Foley
8/10 – Mr. Reliable himself delivered the kind of performance you’d expect from him for 38 games in this campaign. Looked good on the ball and cleaned up most things that came his way. Although I’m sure greater tests await him this season, he passed this first one with flying colours.
Michael Mancienne
8/10 – A classy performance from a class act. He read the game perfectly throughout and covered well on a few occasions. He looked much stronger than I remember him being and it was disappointing to see him go off. Hopefully we’ll see a lot more of him this season, as I think we really need him.
Jody Craddock
6/10 – Competed well in the air with Cole and looked like he enjoyed playing alongside Mancienne. That being said, he did get caught out on a few occasions by West Ham’s pace and movement and he was certainly culpable for losing Upson from that corner for the second goal.
Stephen Ward
8/10 – Great performance from Ward who looked composed on the ball and dealt with Faubert’s marauding runs throughout. When he gets forward to support the midfield, he also looks like he can make something happen. His performance was a big plus for Wolves yesterday and he did a lot to silence his critics. That being said, he’ll be given far greater examinations defensively this season.
Greg Halford
8/10 – A really encouraging performance from one of the signings we all questioned. Smashed in one stinging shot that Green did well to palm away. His ability in the air and that huge throw-in will both come in very handy throughout the course of the season. I’ve always liked this guy as I think he leaves everything on the pitch and he isn’t afraid to get stuck-in. I can see him becoming a big favourite if he maintains the standard he set in this match.
Karl Henry
9/10 – Just pips Milijas to the Man-of-the-Match champagne in my opinion. He tracked back throughout and looked as good as anything West Ham had. His partnership with the Serbian international could be very successful if these early signs are anything to go by.
Nenad Milijas
9/10 – This guy really looks the business to me. Composed on the ball, competes well both in the air and on the ground and never seems flustered. Desperately unlucky not to get on the scoresheet with a few decent efforts and his passing was of the highest quality, culminating in that delicious through-ball for SEBs golden chance.
Matt Jarvis
6/10 – I can’t tell you how highly I rate Matty Jarvis but this just wasn’t his day. Time and time again we worked the ball out to him in space and he never once delivered a telling ball into the area. The frustrating thing was that he constantly had the beating of his full-back but always seem to rush his approach. That being said, his incisive running was once again a very useful tool to have and he was a great outlet down the left. His final ball must improve though if he’s too keep his place in the starting XI.
Andy Keogh
8/10 – The best I’ve seen him play for a long, long time. Enjoyed the space and time on the ball more than anyone else and constantly linked up the play. One ball dropped for him in the box and he typically miscued, but other than that, it was a tidy performance that was full of promise. If I was being cynical, maybe I’d say that if Doyle had been fit, we might have been more of a threat in and around the box, but that would be very unfair on the young striker.
SEB
7/10 – A hard day at the office for Wolves’ number 9. Tried his best to hold the ball up and work openings, but you have to say that Upson and Collins did a great job of shackling him. Had his moment with that one on one but couldn’t find a way passed the impenetrable Robert Green in the Hammers’ goal. We all hope his injury isn’t serious as we’re already lacking firepower. Much more to come from our top marksman.
Substitutes
Richard Stearman
7/10 – Came on for Mancienne and gave everything for the cause. I’d question whether he could have dealt better with the ball over the top, which resulted in him giving the corner away for the second goal. He has this problem with diving in when he doesn’t need to and must learn to stay on his feet more. If he can do that, there’s a top-class centre-half in there who could do very well in the Premiership.
Sam Vokes
7/10 – Came on when the game was turning in West Ham’s favour and when SEB limped off, he was left alone up front and given no chance. It would be completely unfair to judge him on this performance and I hope he gets a decent crack of the whip in future games to show what he can do.
Dave Edwards
7/10 – No time to make a real impact but as usual was full of running. Unfortunately, I’m not sure Big Dave has the quality on the ball to be first-choice this season but I hope he can prove me wrong. He’s certainly got a great engine and gets around the pitch, but at the moment, I’m sure he’ll only be used an impact sub when needed.
What are your player ratings? Leave a comment with yours below. I’m very interested to see if there are any significant differences.
Nice write-up Ben.
I thought the two central midfielders were indeed the biggest plus of the day. Milijas looked classy and assured on the ball, whilst Henry for me was our man of the match. If he keeps that level of performance up all season, then we should have a pretty settled midfield pairing.
A mention as well for Keogh who I thought was excellent. I thought he came short and linked up the play very well.
SEB certainly struggled and didn’t enjoy the best of days. Of course his performance would have had a completely different complexion had he slotted home that chance.
To be honest, I think it’s a bit unfair to say we’re ‘unprepared’. I think its more of a case that injuries have taken away that little bit of killer instinct in attack. Had we been able to call upon the likes of Iwelumo, Doyle and Kightly in particular, I think the final scoreline might have been far more favourable.
sorry. meant to remove the 451 reference as well, as we werent playing it were we?! it just felt it 2nd half when seb looked more isolated. i dont feel we saw the ‘real’ wolves and hope to see it soon when doyle etc get back. i just pray our depleted team can eek out some pts b4 then.
I think you sum it up pretty well lads although it was a definite 4-4-2!
Guys like Ward, Keogh & especially Henry really went up a level and looked more than competent – I was pleasantly surprised if I’m honest. Or to put a negative slant on it – we know they can all play an awful lot worse! Milijas and Mancienne were class, Foley was comfortable.
There were disappointments obviously. I don’t think Jarvis will mess up so many good situations again. Craddock sadly just isn’t up to it – I expected him to be done for pace, I didnt expect him to switch off. Mancienne’s partner, whoever it may be, looks a potential weakness.
Basically, I think there is cause for optimism if the players who played can maintain that standard and we can get SEB, Doyle & Kightly fit. In the short-term I fear for us though – we definitely need those guys fit by Hull at home as that could be must-win unless we pull of a surprise in the 2 away trips coming up.
Overall I was very pleased with the performance, loads of positives we will pick up points in the near future.
It was screened on TV over here, and I must admit even in defeat I thoroughly enjoyed this game! I thought everybody had a reaaly good game – stand out for me the pace and trikery of Keogh, assured passing of Milijas, and for my man of the match Karl Henry – incredible defensive midfield display worthy of the Premiership. I think this defeat will steady our ship and wake us up a bit – I can’t wait for Wigan and our first win!
I would take 1 point off of the marks you gave but apart from that spot on.
I thought we played well with Milijas, Henry and Keogh all class. To me SEB looked off the pace and its a bit worrying and jarvo’s final ball was consistently awful even though he created space for himself really well.
Anyone else heard some rumour Milijas is injured?
A technical goalkeeping point, but Hennessey should have sunk back onto his line after deciding not to come for the cross (2nd goal). If he had the extra foot or so he would have had a pretty good chance of saving the goal.
I thought we were OK, and if we play that well all of the time we’re 60-40 to stay up
Bring on Kightly and Doyle.
What do we think will happen when Jarvis (wasteful), Halford (v good) and Kightly are all fit?
Guys, Adam Bate (exelent comment mate) I think we need to us a bit of perspective here. You can’t say evryone played really well and give a 7/10 team average when we came away 2-0 loosers. By that marking system the West Ham lads would be a world beating team of 9/10′ers which they are not, West Ham are a slightly above average top tem Prem team.
If every one of opur players had a good game and we loose 2-0 at home I am really worried about going to Wigan and only 7 of our players playing well!!!!
I am all for positivity but a reality check is in order. Yes there were massive positves to come from the game, Milijas being the biggest one, on that performance it looks like we have a guunuine top flight player.
Saying Green was there best player I think is a bit of big leap, on the face of things he had a very good game, but look a bit harder and he had only 1 or 2 really good save to make from a wolves player in a good threstening position in the box, SEB one on one save aside, I don’t think there is one you would not expect any C’ship keeper to make let alone England first choice from Wed night.
I think Doyle and Kightly will will make a massive differnce though and look forward to seeing them together with Milijas, Jarvis and SEB.
I don’t want to bring everyone down, but I do want to be realistic, I got cought up in the excitment on Friday, more than a little drunk with anticipation and predicted a 1-0 Wolves win, a prediction completely made with my passionate and optomistic heart. Howerver, Saturday has has soberd me right up and I am now going to prctice sobriety (as far as this blog is concerend).
Emerald Petes comments are spot om for me.
We did as well as we could given the players available and the fact we had a real good go at them mad me proud of them.
Mick Macarthy summed it up though; “We are not a Premiership team but a collection of Championship players who have earned the right to play in the Premiership”.
When the final whistle blew the only Wolves player on the pitch with Premiership experience was Jody Craddock.
We need Doyle, Kites and Big Chris back in action asap but when they are and with one or two more fresh faces (please, please, please of Milijas’ quality) we should be alright.
Some interesting comments here and on WM last night but it makes me smile to see so many praising ‘The Crab’ – Henry. He was my player of the season last season so I’m claiming Chairmanship of the blogs Karl Henry fan club!
Sorry but cant share the enhusiasm for Keogh or Ward. They both put a shift in but Prem quality? Not for me.
FOWB
@Scooped – I agree about Keogh and Ward, moreso Ward. My West Ham supporting friend asked me why Mancienne was playing left back, I had to explain he was covering for an out of position Ward. Also, can I sign up to the Karl Henry fan club, and I have “Henry 8″ on the back of my kit.
Over the course of the season I think we will become:
Hennessey
Foley – Zubar – Mancienne – Elokobi/Hill
Kightly – Milijas – Henry – Jarvis (possibly Halford)
Doyle – Seb
With Surman/ Halford or Jarvis/ Vokes or Keogh making an impact from the bench.
I think we should play Surman at times as well, he’s a good player and will do well. As for Wigan I think we’re going to lose but it’s not the end of the world we haven’t got Ebanks, Kightly, Doyle, Iwelumo, Berra. Would like to see us get a draw but can’t see it happening. Do think we still need one quality player, one more Doyle, >6mil and preferably a defender.
@EmeraldPete – I think you (along with a few others) are perhaps correct when you say I marked players generously. Maybe I should have gone down a point for each of them.
However, I wouldn’t say that just because most of our players got a 7/10 that the West Ham lads deserve higher marks. The fact is that we matched them in every department and were simply undone by one moment of real quality and some slack marking from a corner.
Also, if it wasn’t for Green in the West Ham goal (who would of got a 10/10 from me) the result would have been much different.
@Scooped – I agree with (nearly) all your points, especially when you highlight the fact we’re without Doyle, Kightly and Iwelumo. Put those three back in the mix and the squad suddenly looks substantially stronger.
But when you say Keogh and Ward aren’t up to scratch, I must admit I’m scratching my head a bit. For me, they both stepped up big time on Saturday and I think we need to be fair and judge them on their performances in the Premiership before dismissing them as not being up to the job.
Its all about opinions Thomas. For me, they’re not good enough even when they perform (as they did on Saturday) at 100% of their ability.
In fact, Keogh wasnt up to Championship standard (more like Sunday League) for most of last season and Wards dire positional play means he’ll never be more than a make-shift left back.
But I would defend to the hilt Micks decision to give the players who won us promotion the shirt now. And maybe they’ll prove me wrong – I’d be delighted if they did.
My fear however is that without the rapid addition of more proven Premiership players (and not just instead of Keogh and Ward) we’ll be playing catch-up before the lustre has begun to dull on our season-ticket books.
This praise of Green i find a bit strange. I don’t think he made any remarkable saves. The 1 on 1 with SEB was great keeping but aside from that i would expect a premiership keeper to have saved the others.
Pretty well summed up there, Keogh, Milijas, Henry and Halford stood out for me. They were superb, as was Green for West Ham, although Carlton Cole was a bit on the irratating side.
I thought the main difference between the 2 team was the keeper.Green looked assured and confident, Hennessey exactly the opposite.Other than that I thought we fought hard, matched West Hams’ workrate and can see us getting something at Wigan if we give this sort of performance again. Milijas and Henery will be in lots of people fantasy teams after their respective performamces, and, when we have settled, we will be OK. One thing, I do think we need to loan a striker, as it was sometime shard to see where a goal was coming from. I think Blake was already playng with a knock as he looked a bit off the pace.
@Scooped – You’re quite right, is it indeed all about opinions. A couple of top draw signings would go down well but just getting some of our injured stars back would do for me at the moment.
@kwolf – It wasn’t just shot-stopping from Green that impressed me. His kicking and handling were pretty much flawless throughout. He came and took a number of crosses cleanly and never looked flustered. The save he made low to his left from Milijas was world class. OK, it wasn’t a fingertips round the post, but the speed he got down to it and the fact he parried it so far out of the danger zone was brilliant.
I think it’s too easy to say after a game that a keeper made routine saves just because he made them look routine.
Make no mistake, if Gomes from Spurs was in goal for West Ham, we’d have won that game easily. Haha
Reading through the papers today and the telegraph had Green as man of the match and the sun had him in the team of the week, says a lot.
Keep the faith guys, i think saturday’s performance was one of the most professional i’ve seen for a long while and it’ll only get better as the season goes on. I do think we need to put the yank in goal tomorrow though.
Green made three decent saves but all saves i would expect him to make, we had two decent spells of pressure at the start of both halves but west ham showed consistently more quality than us, two goal line clearances kept us in it.
I’m not trying to sound pessimistic because i’m not i think saturday was as expected, end to end football and better going forward than defending.
For us to stay up we have to believe in our way of playing and take our chances because i don’t see us keeping many clean sheets.
The one really frustrating thing for me was the fact that jarvis is still not producing quality from the excellent positions he gets into, this is a flaw that he has had ever since he signed for us and i would have hoped to see more of an improvement on his delivery by now.
Hopefully we’ll take the positives into the wigan game and get a result.
Likely team for tomorrow:
Hennessey
Stearman
Mancienne
Craddock
Ward
Halford
Henry
Milijas
Jarvis
Keogh
Vokes
I’m going to the game but it could be a long old night if they score early. You have to think now that it would be so much better if these early games were against the Top 4.. West Ham / Wigan / Hull are very winnable with our best team but clearly less so with, depending on your view, as many as 6 of first XI out. Fingers crossed anyway!
By the way, did you see E&S gave Craddock and Henry both 7/10!!!!