West Ham have won only three of their opening 11 Premier League games under Julen Lopetegui and face Newcastle on Monday Night Football, live on Sky Sports Premier League from 6.30pm; Niclas Fullkrug, a £27m summer signing, has not played for the club since August
Monday 25 November 2024 07:25, UK
Julen Lopetegui's appointment at West Ham was meant to herald the arrival of an attacking, bold style of football after the platform built across the previous five years.
A former Spain manager, forged in the 21st century home of aesthetic football, Lopetegui was promised the kind of resources to bring those Iberian philosophies to East London, beyond the limited budget - and pragmatic playing style - he had been forced to adopt in his last job at Wolves.
With a £130m war chest, which may have left former manager David Moyes watching on enviously, the club put its money where its mouth was last summer. Moyes had built West Ham into a team who could win again; a first European trophy in six decades, two more continental quarter-finals, three top-10 finishes from four.
But five months on, few of those have produced much to justify their lofty combined price tags, and the third largest net spend in the Premier League this season.
No-one expected perfect free-flowing football on the table after 11 games, but it is not too much to expect some signs of progress.
But following those years of relative - if limited - stability under Moyes, the chaotic underbelly of a club who went through three managers in four years prior to his second spell has returned. And it might put Lopetegui out of a job less after less than half a season.
The hand the manager has been dealt is not as rosy as the financial backing alone suggests but the results and performances speak for themselves. West Ham are playing within themselves, and could not even find a way past Everton - who had conceded 17 times in their opening 10 games - in a frustrating 0-0 before the international break.
Now it is reported he has two games to save his job. West Ham are a couple of good results away from the top half but the glacial move towards that longed-for style may ultimately prove his undoing.
In Lopetegui's first game in the dugout against Aston Villa it was still Tomas Soucek, a talented player but more physical than technical, making runs into the box to latch onto long balls forward. It raised a few question marks, but was early days.
Now 11 games in, it is still only Jarrod Bowen who can match his 41 opposition-box touches. He ranks higher within the West Ham ranks than even Moyes' last season.
West Ham are playing fewer passes in the opposition half than at any stage under Moyes. The percentage of long passes is stubbornly refusing to drop.
Lopetegui insisted his philosophy is developing at the London Stadium in the build-up to the Everton game before caveating he has had to adapt to his players too. There were hints in the second half, but he needs more than hints at this point.
Especially when the trio of Lucas Paqueta, Mohammed Kudus and Bowen, who created 94 chances between them last season, are three players who would walk into most other teams' front lines. This is not a plan lacking the tools to make it happen.
Paqueta racked up almost half of those chances himself last term but his drop in form is among the biggest headaches for Lopetegui. He could be the creative lynchpin he needs, but under Lopetegui his chance creation has dropped by around a third, not helped by some muddled thinking behind his role.
It took Moyes time to get the best out of the Brazilian but by last season, he had found home almost exclusively on the left flank. This season he has drifted inside more, but ironically has affected the game far less.
Understandably he is beating his man barely half as much as he was, but in a role where he should be creating more, instead his chance creation has fallen by about 20 per cent, his expected assists even further.
Things were at their worst at Nottingham Forest before the international break, where Paqueta found himself the one making runs in behind the home defence to latch onto long balls forward from Bowen.
Paqueta is not fast, nor is he a better finisher than Bowen. It was a strange role reversal and one which will not have helped Lopetegui's attempts to win his players' trust in his methods.
A dynamic forward would help plug the gap he is struggling to fill. Michail Antonio continues to work hard up front, but at 34 his best years are firmly behind him.
Nicklas Fullkrug was meant to solve some of those problems and is a talented goalscorer but as a target man in his 30s, the £27m outlay for a player with essentially zero resale value felt desperate at the time. Given their primary summer target was the younger, more mobile Jhon Duran, a switch to a player of such a different profile is even more confusing.
Not that West Ham could have foreseen quite how injury-hit his arrival would be, but given he has missed more than half a season three times through injury already, they cannot say there were not hints.
This is likely as frustrating to Lopetegui as as it is to owner David Sullivan, and will only be aggravated quite how wasteful West Ham are in front of goal.
Of the 19 players to have a Premier League shot for the club this season, all-but Jarrod Bowen and Crysensio Summerville are underperforming against the xG they have racked up.
Things are little better at the other end where Alphonso Areola's form is the worst in the Premier League. His 'goals prevented' figure stands at just over -4.5. He must take responsibility for that, but even on-form the Frenchman is not a natural fit to Lopetegui's build-from-the-back intentions.
The Hammers' transfer issues have been laid at the feet of technical director Tim Steidten, who despite a questionable recruitment record at the London Stadium is said to be in the running for the vacant sporting director post at Arsenal.
Kudus is the only one of 10 major signings under his remit whose introduction has been a clear success, though last summer's six newcomers could easily still come good.
In mitigation, Moyes' sway in his final season afforded him significant influence over transfers, and Steidten found himself somewhat sidelined over incomings.
But the starting midfield at the City Ground of Edson Alvarez and Guido Rodriguez, were both clear Steidten signings.
Alvarez has shown promise in his time in London, but his disciplinary issues raise an increasing problem for the club given he will miss a fifth game through suspension in barely a season against Everton on Saturday.
That puts extra responsibility on Rodriguez, who after a bright start has struggled - though he also took time to settle at his previous club Betis.
It does not help that in the most physically demanding league in world football both he and Soucek, who have started seven of 11 league games together, rank in the 20 slowest midfielders in the Premier League this season.
Pace alone doesn't guarantee a functioning midfield, but if West Ham are going to control games further up the pitch, a more dynamic engine is a must, especially with extra vulnerability on the counter-attack.
The Declan Rice hole has still not been filled since the start of last season, understandably. That is a problem beyond Lopetegui's making, but it is one he needs to fix.
He switched to a back three at Forest for the first time, after shipping 16 goals in the first nine games. The thinking was that a third centre-back would help cover the gaps left by attacking licence he has given his full-backs, who are ending up inside the opposition box almost twice as much as they were in Moyes' final season.
But Lopetegui's players look devoid of confidence and belief as much as they do tactical understanding at this point, and even before Alvarez's red card, were already well off the pace.
The debacle at Tottenham just over a month ago summed things up. Unusually resolute for 45 minutes after taking an early lead, they collapsed once Yves Bissouma put the hosts ahead for the first time, and went on to concede three times in eight minutes as heads dropped.
Lopetegui has stressed the importance of belief and consistency, and there were shoots of that against an equally nervous Everton team in the final game before the international break.
But he is working from such a low ebb that something substantial will need to change for West Ham to upset the odds against resurgent Newcastle, or Mikel Arteta's Arsenal, in the two games which have been rumoured to decide his future.
If that is the case, his fate may have already been decided.
Watch Newcastle vs West Ham on Sky Sports Premier League from 6.30pm on Monday, kick-off at 8pm.
