Attack and defense are suffering for the Hammers ahead of their matchup with Nottingham Forest.
David Moyes is adamant that his team’s dismal recent performance is not the result of doubt around his future at West Ham.
On Saturday, the Hammers will play Nottingham Forest in the Premier League in an effort to break their winless start to 2024 for the ninth time.
The collapse has raised additional questions over Moyes’s future. The Scot’s contract expires at the conclusion of the current campaign, and the club’s board wants to wait to sign Moyes until after the Irons stop their current losing streak before making a decision.
Speaking in December, Moyes expressed concern that his players would become distracted by unclear circumstances as the season progressed, but the 60-year-old said this hasn’t happened before the team heads to the City Ground.
He remarked, “I get along so well with the players and have been around with them for a while. I’ve got such a good relationship with them.” “I’ve brought a sizable number of them inside the club, but not all of them. Nothing wrong with my positive relationships with any of them.
“I would promptly ensure that it was resolved if I believed it was negatively impacting them in any manner.”
The way his team played in their 6-0 thumping of Arsenal at home on Sunday, following a 3-0 loss to Manchester United the week before, infuriated Moyes.
The main source of fan criticism of Moyes is his allegedly excessively conservative style of play; some fans are even advocating for the appointment of a more innovative manager in the summer.
But after watching his team let up nine goals in their past two League games, Moyes acknowledged that his biggest worry is their unusual defensive weakness.
“It’s really disappointed me,” he remarked. “We haven’t played as well defensively as my teams have in the past.
“I will always accept responsibility, but there is a certain amount of accountability where [the players] must take the field and show their mettle.”
In their last five games, the Hammers had only managed three goals, despite missing part or all of that period due to injuries to important forwards Lucas Paqueta, Mohammed Kudus, and Michail Antonio.
We don’t give in to their objectives,” Moyes went on. “Normally, we’re among the teams that have a strong defensive record and perhaps a lower goal total. We were scoring goals in most of the games throughout the first part of the season, and we were starting to look good.
Our objectives have changed for a variety of reasons, but that shouldn’t have had a negative defensive impact. To ensure that we were at least maintaining clean sheets or competing for tight draws, we ought to have had the steel to do so.
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