That West Ham United are in ‘save the season’ territory with only three games gone in league and cup does not reflect very well at all on Graham Potter.
Hammers News were informed after the 5-1 drubbing by Chelsea that Graham Potter was not under any immediate threat of the sack.
But as tensions boiled over following another dismal collapse – Potter was forced to defend Jarrod Bowen after the captain found himself at the heart of a full-time row with one irate supporter – the question on everybody’s lips is, ‘how much longer can things really go on like this’?
That was certainly one of the questions put to Jason Cundy after West Ham United’s already dismal start to the season took another turn for the worse at Molineux.
Speaking on talkSPORT, performing a brutal autopsy on a Hammers side with more problems than Jay Z on a bad day, Cundy does still feel there is one potential solution. Move Potter out, and pounce on Nuno Espirito Santo’s Nottingham Forest frustrations.
Graham Potter watches on during Wolverhampton Wanderers v West Ham United - Carabao Cup Second Round
Photo by James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images
Jason Cundy tips Nuno Espirito Santo as West Ham United’s Graham Potter successor
To think, the fact that Nuno could realistically lose his job before his opposite number at the London Stadium is testament to the bizarre nature of this most baffling of games.
Hammers News’ chief football correspondent Graeme Bailey told TBR Football, after Nuno’s shock outburst against Forest’s madcap owner Evangelos Marinakis, that former Tottenham boss Ange Postecoglou had been lined up to potentially take his place.
If Nuno does indeed depart – the relationship between coach and owner has ‘changed’, he said on Friday – then who better to take West Ham forward? A coach who took over at the City Ground when Nottingham Forest were mired in 17th, and ended their 30-year wait for a European return just 17 months later.
MORE WEST HAM STORIES
Do the same job at West Ham, and Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters may be joined by another immortalised in bronze outside the London Stadium. We jest of course, but a dramatic upturn in results would make any new manager an immediate fan favourite.
“They are terrible. At the moment, they look doomed but who knows what’s going to happen with Nuno Espirito Santo,” says Cundy, who represented the Hammers’ London rivals Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and Crystal Palace in the 1990s.
“If he leaves Forest, which from what we understand might happen, all of a sudden he becomes available. If Potter continues like this and they bring Nuno in…
“So things can change.”
West Ham players walk off the pitch dejected after a shambolic defeat to Sunderland
Photo by Rob Newell – CameraSport via Getty Images
Potter on the defensive as West Ham exit the Carabao Cup
After a couple of fiery press conferences from the usually cool-headed Potter, West Ham’s beleaguered boss was on the defensive following Jorgen Strand Larsen’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it brace in Wolverhampton.
The nature of Wolves’ opener – Rodrigo Gomes following up after Hwang Hee-Chan’s penalty bounced back off the post – summed up West Ham’s fortune, or a lack thereof, he argued. Though what is it they say about making your own luck?
Tony Gale was in no mood to defend Guido Rodriguez, and to a lesser extent Alphonse Areola, after the Hammers legend saw his old club concede 13 goals in just three matches.
“I thought there were lots of positives. First-half, we were probably the better team, unlucky to go a goal down,” Potter protested. “The manner of the first goal I think sums up where we are at the moment. It hit the post and rebounds straight to them and goes in.
“But I thought the performance in the first-half was solid, the response in the second-half was good. We scored two good goals but then the substitutions for them probably turned the game a little bit.
“We weren’t able to hang on and it’s disappointing to go out.”