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There has been so much speculation over the future of West Ham boss Slaven Bilic, with one recent report claiming he will be sacked if his side fails to finish in the top 10, but Hammers joint-chairman David Gold has defended the former Croatian international manager. "There is no issue between me and the board and Slaven," Gold insisted. "I go to every board meeting, and in the board there have been no discussions over Slaven, he's our manager we all like him, he's a great guy."

Because of the recent poor run of form and also because it has been International break week, the tabloids and to a certain extent social media have been conducting a 'Billic witch hunt'. The Telegraph being the latest to jump on board by declaring 'Huddersfield Town manager David Wagner has emerged as a potential candidate for the West Ham job if the owners decide in the summer that Slaven Bilic is not the man to take the club forward in the long term.' Well there you have it, it must be true mustn't it?

With confirmed injuries to key players West Ham United will have to send out a very different team to that which lost 2-3 to Leicester City at the London Stadium. Pedro Obiang and Diafra Sakho are ruled out for the rest of the season with Angelo Ogbonna unlikely to return either following surgery, Winston Reid is currently injured and is not expected to return for at least 4-6 weeks and as if these problems were not a big enough head ache for Hammers under fire manager Slaven Billic, Michail Antonio has been ruled out for a month as well!

West Ham United's recent poor run of results has had fans wondering what on earth can be done to reverse the current unwelcome trend, the dropping or unavailability for selection of captain Mark Noble was seen as the catalyst for the team to push on enabling players to fill their natural positions. That all went wrong within eight minutes in the match against Leicester City with the team shipping two goals and influential captain for the day Winston Reid succumbing to a thigh injury.

Everyone knows misquotes and non existent rumours suddenly surface during the International break in order to fill the Premier League void, and this break is no exception. 'News' that West Ham United are interested in signing Manchester United's £300,000 per week captain Wayne Rooney is a case in point, you can almost hear the brain cell crunching involved in creating such a ludicrous story, are you sitting comfortably?

West Ham United's London Stadium home may well be the venue for the biggest crowd in England to attend a cricket match in modern history, the English Cricket Board is hopeful of staging two separate matches at the former Olympic Stadium during the next ICC World Cup which is due to take place in England and Wales in 2019. One of the fixtures will feature England and could be watched by a crowd of 66,000, more than double the capacity of Lord’s.

Given that their team were 2-0 down after less than ten minutes and that their 'new' captain lasted only until the 18th minute, the crowd at West Ham's london Stadium could have been forgiven for 'doing a highbury', but the exact opposite happened. After the initial shock of going behind and losing Winston Reid the crowd suddenly found it's voice, a voice which easily drowned out the predictably boring chants from the Leicester City fans and filled the air with the sort of intimidating atmosphere not experienced during a day time match since the club left the Boleyn.

West Ham United: Randolph, Reid (c), Cresswell, Byram, Kouyate, Fonte, Ayew, Lanzini, Obiang, Antonio, Carroll Subs: Adrian, Nordtveit, Collins, Masuaku, Snodgrass, Fernandes, Feghouli
Leicester City: Schmeichel Simpson Morgan Huth Fuchs Mahrez Ndidi Drinkwater Albrighton Okazaki Vardy Subs: Chilwell King Amartey Slimani Zieler Gray Ulloa

Michail Antonio has been included in Gareth Southgate's England squad but there is no place for Andy Carroll, some fans will be breathing a sigh of relief!
England Squad in fulll..

West Ham United are currently looking to recruit not one but two strikers or one of both for next season which raises questions as to whether Andy Carroll will be on his way. Reports suggest that having grown weary of signing injury prone players the Hammers hierarchy are looking to Premier League rivals Arsenal's 28-year-old Spanish forward Lucas Perez, Perez joined the Gunners last summer in a £17million switch from Spanish side Deportivo but is reported to be looking for a way out already, having failed to break into the first team at the Emirates on a regular basis.