Bilic on surviving as West Ham manager
Slaven Bilic believes an exciting set of transfers will help West Ham to forget last season, as he tells Jason Burt
It is an indication of the fire and enthusiasm coursing through Slaven Bilic that one answer – the first answer to a gentle opening question of simply “how are you?” – to start this interview takes precisely 10 minutes and 40 seconds to complete.
In short, the West Ham United manager is happy. Very, very happy ahead of the Premier League season opener at Manchester United tomorrow.
A hip replacement, his second, has increased his mobility, “100 per cent, totally” changing his life, while West Ham have undergone major surgery in the transfer market after a difficult campaign.
“It was not an enjoyable season and it was the season when we suffered but you only improve through suffering,” Bilic says. “When do you improve your fitness? When you suffer. If you are jogging and it’s easy you are not going to get fit. You have to suffer. So was it enjoyable? No. Would I like it to happen again? Of course not. But would I swap it for the season before after it finished? No. No. Because it builds you. It makes you stronger.”
It is a telling response. West Ham are stronger. In has come Marko Arnautovic, for a club-record fee of up to £24 million, Javier Hernandez, Pablo Zabaleta and, on a season-long loan, Joe Hart. All four were Bilic’s firstchoice signings – and it is rare for a club to be able to pull that off.
“We made our list and the No1 player was Arnautovic, the No1 striker was Chicharito and the same for Zabaleta,” he says. “Pablo was out of contract [at Manchester City] but for the other two it looked like we might have to go to option No2, or three, who were also good, but I decided to wait. I had a feeling we’d get them and the chairman [David Sullivan] has done really, really well.
“Joe also happened. We had two really good goalkeepers so we were calm about it. But we were in Austria [on pre-season tour] and I got a call and they said, ‘It’s possible for Joe Hart’. And we jumped on it. It’s a big, big signing. The England No1 and for a reason.
“But all four have a lot to prove. Marko, Chicharito, Pablo and Joe, especially. He was in Torino last season and he wants to prove to Man City, to the whole of England. We wanted players who are a good age, with experience of the Premier League but who are still hungry, who still have something to prove. Chicharito is back and he’s like a kid now, he’s so happy.”
The signing of Arnautovic, in particular, excites him. Having lost Dimitri Payet in January the Austrian could be West Ham’s talisman. “We lacked killers. We lacked a presence,” Bilic says. “He’s consistent on a high level. And the most important thing is that everybody, when you watch him, including me, it’s like, ‘He’s good but he can do more’. He has not reached his peak. Every manager thinks, ‘At least he’s going to be this’, which I am happy with but hopefully I am going to get more. I told him. He has a cannon in his right foot. He is so strong, no one can stop him.”
There is fresh optimism – a quality Bilic knows, after last year’s move to the former Olympic Stadium, has to be properly harnessed. “I love football; I love my job. But this is also very dangerous,” he says. “I don’t want it to happen that people get carried away. I am a West Ham guy. I played here and I am the manager. I am West Ham for a long time so I know it’s a special club. We went to a new stadium and suddenly everybody is talking about Champions League. And I want it. I
want it. I am not afraid of it but just because we moved stadiums – first of all that was an obstacle. It was the best thing for the club but it takes time.
“What I am saying, and this is my message to the players and the fans, is that we have done well in the transfer window but so have a few other clubs – Southampton, Watford – and it’s not going to be easy because we have signed a few players.
“What we need to do is leave our hearts on the pitch. On the training pitch. Not just at Old Trafford on Sunday but before that and tomorrow and the next day and the next day. We are not going to be good because we praise the players
‘We had two good keepers but I got a call and they said, “It’s possible for Joe Hart”. We jumped on it. He has a lot to prove – to the whole country’
we have bought and their price tag and all that. We don’t have to be afraid of predictions. But they mean nothing.”
There were fears, towards the end of the last campaign, of another prediction: that Bilic might lose his job. Instead he has survived, thrived, and is happy to back himself going into the final year of the three-year deal he signed when he succeeded Sam Allardyce. Having impressively finished seventh, he guided West Ham to 11th last season – respectable but not without the trauma of fearing relegation.
“New stadium, injuries, bad start. Mayday straight away,” Bilic says. “You said it, it was a ‘perfect storm’. But in those moments we showed fight. Fight [thumping his fist into his palm]. One-nil, one-nil, one-nil. It makes you stronger. All the time, though, we were in the turbulent zone but there were lessons. Transfer window, training. We didn’t want it but sometimes it happens.
“Let me give you one example. [Striker] Simone Zaza is a good player. A good player. I know that. But he’s a player who didn’t play for Juventus every Saturday which is why he came to West Ham. He came last day of the transfer window in a situation where [Andy] Carroll is injured, [Diafra] Sakho is injured, [Enner] Valencia has gone to Everton. So Simone Zaza jumps off the plane.
“We didn’t want to push him but we needed a player. So we had to push him on to the pitch. And he burned out. His first game we were winning against Watford 2-0 [they lost 4-2] and had a chance to make it three and if he had scored maybe everything would have been different. And it was the same for some other players.
“We had some good players but it went wrong for them from the start. It was different for players who were already here – Mark Noble, [Winston] Reidy, [James] Collins, [Aaron] Cresswell, [Michail] Antonio. September was hard. We were not good. But they had something positive from the season before. We were s--- but they had something in their memories to sustain them. The other guys, they were in shock.
“It’s like when you have a child and you are with them every day and you don’t notice how they grow but when somebody comes, after two months, he goes, ‘How he’s grown!’ So when you live with your players maybe you don’t always notice. Of course people say, ‘You should have seen it because it’s so obvious’. But we are talking about small margins. Multiply that by 11, though, and because this is the Premier League, then it is crucial. It’s big.”
A second season at the London Stadium will be easier, he argues. It already, Bilic says, feels like home. “I saw players feeling like it was our pitch,” he says. “[Manuel] Lanzini knows – he now thinks, ‘Ah, last season I scored from here [against Tottenham Hotspur]. I will go again’. There are good memories and the fans also feel more comfortable, so we are expecting this season to be better than last.”
But did he ever fear for his job? “I am 48. I said after [Claudio] Ranieri [was sacked by Leicester City] everything negative and positive is possible,” Bilic says. “Ranieri won the league which was great, for all of us. But when they sacked Ranieri then anybody can be sacked. It’s not an exception. [Jose] Mourinho won the league [with Chelsea] and was sacked by December. When I close my eyes I am very realistic. I am not stupid. I know if you have a good run someone is going to offer you a better job. When you have a bad run your contract does not save you. It does not matter if you have one year or eight years.
“Your contract is the last five games and the next five games depending on how they go. I would have been sad. I love this job and this club, but I was never negative. I know I am not a jumbo jet like Mourinho, [Pep] Guardiola, [Jurgen] Klopp but I also know my position and what I can do.”
Tomorrow he faces Mourinho – with the United manager mischievously declaring that the quality of West Ham’s signings suggests they, too, are going for the title. “It’s Jose!” Bilic says. “But I love him. He said that to a little bit warn his fans and the media but also he respects us and he wanted to show that West Ham have done good in the transfer window.” They have.
‘I know I am not Mourinho or Guardiola but I know my position and what I can do’