HAMMERS FANS STOCK UP WITH PLENTY OF BOOS
Wait for Christmas will be a worrying one for under-pressure boss Moyes
FOR those football folk not involved in the World Cup, the next couple of weeks are supposed to offer a chance to reflect and recharge.
A chance to take stock of a crazy period and reset before domestic business picks up again on Boxing Day.
David Moyes will get all that but it will no doubt be underpinned by a nagging concern that his West Ham paymasters could decide that the poor start to the season means it is time for a change.
Moyes, you would think, has enough credit in the bank for that not to be the case and the club’s owners have proven over the years that they are willing to give managers plenty of time to turn things round.
But there is no disguising the fact that a team which finished seventh in May to qualify for Europe should not be hovering one point above the relegation zone after 15 matches.
And recent results – it is now one win in six Premier League games after this defeat by Leicester – will certainly have given those in the corridors of power plenty to ponder in the coming days and weeks.
The boos which greeted the final whistle on Saturday offered a further sign of the increasing frustration in these parts.
Even the most fervent Moyes supporters must concede they were not unjustified after his selection were second best throughout against a side who have had their own troubles this season, but finally seem to be sorting themselves out.
West Ham were not even buoyed by Lukasz Fabianski’s penalty save from Youri Tielemans when they trailed 1-0 following an early goal by James Maddison (below, right).
And when Harvey Barnes (below) put the game to bed with a late second for the Foxes, the sound from the away end soon turned from cheers to mocking chants of, ‘We can see you sneaking out’ towards the disgruntled home faithful.
Moyes is unsurprisingly in the camp which feels he deserves time and he echoed what Leicester boss Brendan Rodgers, himself no stranger to pressure this season, had said moments earlier about the benefits of having the backing from his board.
“I’m really grateful to our club for the support they’ve given me,” said Moyes.
“I’d also like to say I think I’ve not done badly for them over the last two-and-a-half years either, so it works both ways.
“We’ve done a lot of good things.
“But we can’t find a way of scoring goals at the moment.
“It’s not for the want of trying and not for trying to get that to work.”
As for the month ahead, he added: “You’d rather go into the break in good form than you would bad form.
“We have to accept it. We come back and get ourselves ready and dust ourselves down and ready to go again.”
Leicester have now won four of their last five in the top flight and goalkeeper Danny Ward said: “It’s brilliant to finish off the recent run and go into the break with a win.
“That gives us a little bit more incentive for when we do come back as well.”