West Ham ‘ashamed’ as Wally’s wonders march on
WIMBLEDON boss Wally Downes hailed his FA Cup heroes last night for humbling West Ham and sealing their spot in the fifth round.
The stunning defeat, which left Manuel Pellegrini ‘ashamed’ of his players, saw the League One strugglers take a 3-0 lead after 46 minutes at Kingsmeadow.
Speaking afterwards, Downes said: ‘Of course, you don’t expect to be 3-0 up against a Premier League team and at half-time I said you don’t get medals at half-time in any game.
‘It was important we approached the second half well. We proved that by getting the third goal, it was terrific. I’m really pleased for the boys. They put in a shift.
‘The first time they’ve not performed for me was Tuesday night (in a 3-0 loss to Fleetwood Town). Having to play this game the fear factor kicked in.
‘If they’d played as badly it would have been a cricket score. The attitude was spot-on tonight.
‘I was pleased to get the fourth, it gave them a chance to enjoy the last two or three minutes. Everyone could enjoy it.’
Wimbledon are eight points adrift of safety in the third tier of English football, but they rekindled the Crazy Gang spirit of years gone by to produce their shock victory.
The hosts, playing their first FA Cup fourth-round tie since their reformation in 2002, had West Ham rattled in the opening stages and Terrell Tomas blazed an excellent chance over the crossbar from 10 yards out.
Then Mitch Pinnock’s ball in from a free-kick forced an unconvincing punch clear from Hammers keeper Adrian, who also did well to hold a header from the midfield man.
Kwesi Appiah struck the deserved opener 11 minutes before the break.
Worse was to come seven minutes later, Pedro Obiang allowing Scott Wagstaff to rob him on the halfway line and race through. The former Charlton midfielder still had plenty to do but kept his composure to beat the onrushing Adrian and give the minnows a 2-0 interval lead.
A clearly unimpressed Pellegrini made a triple substitition at half-time, turning to Ryan Fredericks, Lucas Perez and record signing Felipe Anderson.
But 41 seconds in, his side found themselves three goals down, Appiah crossing for Wagstaff to poke home from 12 yards out.
Perez pulled one back in the 57th minute, sweeping the ball home after a goalmouth scramble, and when Anderson curled in a delightful free-kick with 20 minutes remaining alarm bells began to ring for the hosts.
Wimbledon’s Tennai Watson was possibly too honest by continuing his run after he was clipped by Arthur Masuaku in the area.
However, Toby Sibbick came off the bench and almost immediately brought the house down with an 88th-minute header to seal a memorable victory and compound the visitors’ embarrassment.
Marko Arnautovic was not in the West Ham squad having had his head turned by a mega-money offer from China earlier this month. But after the defeat, the club announced that the Austrian striker had, in fact, signed a contract extension.
Asked about the 29-year-old Austrian’s new deal, Pellegrini said: ‘I only talk about the cup. Ask me about the game today and I will answer. Any other question I will not answer.’
Reporters then said that Arnautovic having just signed a new contract made the questions relevant.
‘You are talking about the game?’ said Pellegrini, before turning and storming down the tunnel.
The Chilean had said that he found it shameful to lose to the side sitting bottom of League One.
On whether he was angry at half-time in the dressing room, Pellegrini said: ‘Yes of course. I was ashamed of them.
‘Attitude, playing against a team that sits two divisions below us, but in football you can lose in two or three balls.
‘They started the way we needed to start and when you have such high pace with the quality of the players and we didn’t have the same level.’