West Ham’s owners have been forced to respond to growing claims that Graham Potter is already on the brink of the sack after a nightmare start to the new campaign.
Hammers News exclusive
This time last week West Ham vice-chair Karren Brady essentially gave Graham Potter a very public vote of confidence after the Hammers opened the season with a 3-0 defeat at Sunderland.
Although top pundit Simon Jordan believes Brady has left the door wide open for West Ham to sack Potter if things don’t improve.
There was no sign of any improvement when London rivals Chelsea came to the London Stadium on Friday night.
The Hammers rolled over and had their bellies tickled by Chelsea, who could have won by more had they not eased up after taking a 5-1 lead.
West Ham fans vented their feelings with their voices and their feet.
Chants of ‘sack the board’ rang out around the ground before the stadium emptied when Chelsea hit the fourth and fifth early in the second half.
West Ham’s situation is complex.
Potter is clearly not the cause of the club’s problems because this alarming regression started under David Moyes back in January 2024 and continued through the experienced Julen Lopetegui.
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But on the evidence of his first eight months in the job, the jury is very much out on whether he can be the solution either.
West Ham have won just five of his 21 games in charge.
Last season Potter had the very legitimate excuse that he was inheriting someone else’s team – and one that, as he has stated publicly on several occasions, was in a mess.
This is where Potter’s excuses start running thin.
His record was worse than Lopetegui’s in his half-a-season in charge last term.
Potter has gone on record saying West Ham’s owners and fans can now start to truly judge him after he had a full pre-season with the team and brought in some of his own players.
West Ham’s undeniable issues become more difficult to unpack when it comes to transfers.
West Ham players have a chat on the pitch during the thrashing to Chelsea
Photo by Julian Finney/Getty Images
There are doubts Potter had anything to do with – or even particularly wanted – Kyle Walker-Peters and Callum Wilson.
The duo, who turn 29 and 34 respectively this season, do not fit his publicly stated transfer policy.
But Potter has toed the party line since their arrivals, talking up what they will bring to his squad and insisting he did want them.
The head coach’s handling of the goalkeeper situation has been at best naïve and at worst nothing short of shambolic.
Alphonse Areola has been poor since becoming West Ham’s number one.
West Ham owners react to claims Potter is on the brink
But Potter chose to release Lukasz Fabianski and spend £15.5m on relegated Leicester star Mads Hermansen – a club record for a goalkeeper.
Areola ended pre-season in decent form, being the hero in West Ham’s pre-season penalty shootout win over Lille.
Despite having trained only three days with his new teammates, Hermansen was thrown straight into the starting XI at Sunderland.
The move backfired as Hermansen was poor on all three goals.
The Dane, who is one of the smallest goalkeepers in the Premier League – a full 10cm shorter than Areola – was then at fault as the Hammers were smashed by Chelsea and there are calls for the Frenchman to come back in.
A crestfallen Graham Potter on the sideline as West Ham are beaten 5-1 by Chelsea
Photo by Marc Atkins/Getty Images
Fans are bemused by Potter’s obsession with starting the immobile, sideways-passing James Ward-Prowse and insistence on playing wingbacks – a formation that has never really worked for West Ham bar a couple of seasons under Harry Redknapp.
Potter has also caused confusion by bemoaning West Ham’s lack of leadership despite having taken the decision to release Aaron Cresswell, Fabianski, Vladimir Coufal and Michail Antonio, loan out Edson Alvarez and drop Tomas Soucek.
On the flip side the lack of signings is clearly the major issue for the club with one week left of the window.
Before the season started club legend Tony Cottee warned Potter he will be sacked if West Ham didn’t start well in the first six games.
After the dismal start to the new campaign, speculation has immediately ramped up that Potter could be the third manager to come and go in just over a year.
Now West Ham’s owners have reacted to claims Potter is on the brink of being sacked.
Reports have emerged stating Potter could be axed following the defeats to Sunderland and Chelsea.
Hammers board respond emphatically to Potter sack claims
Some have stated the 50-year-old has been given two games to save his job – against Wolves in the League Cup on Tuesday and Nottingham Forest in the Premier League on Sunday.
Even more ominous for the manager is that the Forest game is followed by the first two-week international break of the new season – traditionally when clubs are more inclined to make managerial changes.
Hammers News reached out to the top spokesman for West Ham’s owners about the claims they could wield the axe on Potter this week.
The response was as emphatic as it can get.
In a short, sharp statement, West Ham’s top senior spokesman told Hammers News the claims have no foundation in reality.
“TOTAL rubbish,” the top spokesman for West Ham’s owners told Hammers News when asked whether Potter could be sacked this week.
Whether two more defeats would change that landscape remains to be seen.
Hopefully that question won’t need to be answered and Potter can get a positive result or two.