Having to send a team out devoid of its entire first choice in defence was hard enough, but to then be deprived of your main striker with only a few hours notice made it almost mission impossible for David Moyes West Ham away to Tottingham in the Carabao Cup semi final.
The end to end game was decided by a three goal spell ALL within the space of five first half minutes, the home team took the lead only for it to be cancelled out by a superb bit of improvisation by Jarrod Bowen following a miss hit by Nikola Vlasic. Unfortunately the parity only lasted a couple of minutes before the home team scored again.
Matters weren't helped by Hugo Lloris deciding to have a mater class in goal as he deprived Hammers of at least three certain goals, he somehow kept an energised Hammers from equalizing right up until the very last minute of play. No one can say Hammers didn't give it a real go, on another day the outcome could have gone West Ham's way, alas it was not to be.
There is no disgrace for a severely depleted team to have been beaten by a home side that was at full strength, one that had the benefit of having been able to rest and recuperate their players for THREE additional games more than the Irons had.
Losing important players like Michail Antonio to Covid will be more frequent, as unfortunately the Omicron variant is more than likely going to be the main team selector for many team's line ups for the foreseeable future, at least in the short term and it will hit clubs irrespective of their size, although those with huge squads will obviously be able to cope much better than those with limited squads, such as West Ham.
Hammers can now concentrate on the LEAGUE and the FA Cup, ahead of the last sixteen of the UEFA Europa League Cup, a competition that has qualification for the champions League as a prize whereas the Carabao Cup doesn't! - LN
Comments
Seeing the line up
I didn't think we had a prayer.But for lloris we would have beat them.It maybe a 2 bob cup but the game meant a real lot to our fans,years ago I couldn't give a monkeys about spurs they weren't really rivals but nowadays they have the most mouthy & deluded fan base I know.Conte is a good match imo! Vlasic & lanzini were taken off when we were going for it,vlasic had his best game by a country mile!Wouldn't it have been better to take Ashby & either mas or souscef off?? I'm sure vlasic.lanzini,Bowen,benny,fornals,Rice bombing forward,Johnson attacking wing back would have gave it a real go to get an equaliser.Moyes has been great for us but sometimes his substitutions are baffling...rant over
agree 65 about Vlasic, his
agree 65 about Vlasic, his best game but still woefully short for me and has less impact in a game than say Lanz. I am fed up with Benny now, hes had loads of chances in the first team and his shooting ability is miserable, never on target and the bloke in row Z is in danger of getting hit! We need a goal scorer or a CF if you like, a CB and Jesse asap!
OK Im grumpy today, I just hate losing to that lot!
Agree Dartford
Benny has got so much ability but have said it for a while his finishing is woefull.He had one sublime effort that would have been a worldy but still not on target! Most of the time his shots land in Row Z.Like you mate I had the raving hump losing to that lot,but hey ho it's westham...Merry Xmas to you & your family Dartford
deprived of your main striker?
He's our ONLY striker and thats questionable, still more of a winger! The Chickens will always come home to roost, the unholy trinity didnt commit to a striker as at least back up so no surprise we struggle. They give my a*** a toothache! This game was there for the taking, like you said narrowly missed out.
Even MORE frustrating
was the fact that VAR was NOT in operation and that one of their players was in an offside position for one of the goals, even standing in Areolas eyeline.
A fact that has been confirmed in at least two newspaper reports I've read on the game.
Spot on Bobby
I did think at the time,that the goal was offside & was thinking where the f*ck was VAR!!But yeah no VAR for the league Cup...bonkers imo
Oh and one other thing.
It's interesting that Liverpool's game has already been postponed. Brendan Rogers was absolutely right in what he said about the big clubs bias even when it comes to Covid!!!