Saturday 4th February 2017 – remember that date? I do, that was the day when West Ham United last picked up three points in a 3-1 away win against Southampton.
The club have failed to win a game in the past seven fixtures since and picked up just two points out of the possible 21 available in that time. This is relegation form, no doubt about it.
Let’s back track to the start of the season and look at the first seven games. We picked up four points from a possible 21, which is also relegation form.
The most important thing we have to do now is get results. Whether it’s a 1-0 last minute winner, we have to fight until the very end to secure as many points as possible. West Ham have seven games left, four of which are at home (Swansea City, Everton, Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool). The three away games come at Sunderland, Stoke City and Burnley. The meetings with Swansea, Sunderland, Stoke and Burnley will determine our fate.
Swansea City are currently 18th in the league and their form away from home is tragic, their season average for collecting points on the road is 0.67 per game. After being ‘robbed’ by Spurs on Wednesday night, their morale must be at an all-time low and West Ham must go for the jugular and kill off a relegation rival.
A win against the Swans will give the club a second double of the season, the first being against Crystal Palace. Talk about being a six pointer!
Sunderland are sitting at the bottom of the league and already look like a relegated team, they are ten points behind Hull City. Their home form is similar to Swansea’s away form and they are struggling to pick up points. This is a HUGE game to pick up some vital away points to push towards safety. If the Hammers manage to come away from the Stadium of Light with maximum points, this could be the light at the end of the tunnel.
Stoke City away is an opportunity to get a draw, keep the squad fit and concentrate on the back-to-back home games against Spurs and Liverpool. Stoke’s home form is quite good, averaging three points every two games, which is the type of form that secures mid-table status. The fixture on 19th April won’t be on a cold wet Wednesday night, but a rather warm sunny Saturday afternoon.
The Potters could do without playing a team in a relegation dogfight, so a stubborn Hammers side shutting up shop and relying on counter attacks to get goals is predicted. A draw would be a good result as it was in the reverse fixture at the London Stadium.
Burnley away on the last day of the season would have been the best game to play when the fixture list came out in the summer. However, this game is the biggest of them all if we fail to get a minimum of six points in the games before.
Burnley’s home form has been outstanding, statistically every three games they get six points. Away from home Burnley are the complete opposite, having to play five games to get a single point.
If Slaven’s men can get seven points, a draw away at Burnley could be a fantastic result to secure our safety this season.
West Ham have collected 33 points from 31 games in the Premier League, which is an average of 1.06 points per game. Our remaining seven opponents have a collective 1.32 points per game, which means that West Ham ‘could’ get seven points in their last seven fixtures to hit the 40 point ‘safety’ target and live to fight another season.
Statistics don’t lie and there are five teams in the league that have a worse point(s) per game ratio, two of those teams are our next two games; Swansea City (0.90) and Sunderland (0.67)
Whatever’s happened before has happened, the only thing we can influence is the future outcome. All we can do as fans is go to the games to encourage, support, advise and cheer on our players.
The last thing we want to do is revolt and start fighting against one another. The players know how bad they have been performing and maybe part of that form is because us fans are on their backs in a negative way.
Yes, we have every right to be upset considering the poor performances, poor recruitment, poor management, poor media and poor ownership, but that is only going to further damage the club’s morale.
We have to stick with the club we love regardless of who the manager is, regardless of what player puts on the shirt and regardless of who the owners are – the only thing that doesn’t change at the football club is the fans.
Let’s show the entire club that we do not deserve to go down and let’s install more passion and more heart so the players and manager thrive off our atmosphere to get positive performances and positive results.
Seven points from seven games is doable.
COYI!
