One of the more depressing aspects of West Ham’s slide into the Championship has been the constant chirping from David Sullivan’s fiancée, Ampika Pickston.
You may remember earlier this season following defeat to Manchester City when the former glamour model recorded herself singing along to Manchester City songs in what was, at best, a complete failure to read the room or, at worst, outright trolling of West Ham supporters.
Considering Ms Pickston was a guest of West Ham United at the time, you’d have thought she might have decided to keep her head down after the backlash which followed.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t appear to be happening.
If anything, things seem to have escalated further this morning after another social media post which has once again left many supporters furious.
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Pickston Lectures West Ham Fans
Posting on Instagram this morning, Pickston wrote:
“It’s easy to point the finger and blame. This serves no merit. Lessons are learnt. You learn from experiences. Life shapes us all. The only way is up now.”
Where do you even start with such painfully vague twaddle?
Ampika took to social media to lecture West Ham fans
Firstly, lessons do not appear to have been learnt at all. If anything, under Sullivan’s stewardship, West Ham continue to repeat the same mistakes over and over again.
It really would be something if the club hierarchy had genuinely learned from experience, but nothing about the way the football club is currently being run suggests that is the case.
And as for it being “easy to point the finger”, if supporters are blaming the chairman then it’s only because he has made himself the central figure in every major football decision for years.
Fans Don’t Want Corporate Motivational Speak
No doubt Ms Pickston would prefer everybody simply ignored the hundreds of millions of pounds worth of debt and the fact West Ham have just been relegated.
But if she genuinely believes the board can cocoon themselves from criticism while supporters quietly nod along to motivational platitudes on Instagram, then it probably demonstrates just how detached from reality things have become.
The line about “the only way is up” was particularly alarming because it suggests a complete lack of understanding not just of West Ham United, but of the football pyramid itself.
Make no mistake about it, under the current ownership there is absolutely no guarantee this football club bounces straight back. Plenty of clubs far healthier than West Ham have slipped further after relegation.
And honestly, supporters could probably do without the corporate self-help speak and vague accusations being fired in their direction right now.
Sullivan Silent While Pickston Speaks
What makes the whole thing even stranger is that David Sullivan himself has still failed to make any kind of meaningful public statement about his intentions for West Ham United.
Instead, the chairman remains silent while his fiancée increasingly appears to speak on behalf of the ownership through social media posts.
Possibly the most bizarre part of all is that Pickston must surely know exactly what reaction these posts are going to generate.
Her timeline will now inevitably be flooded with angry West Ham fans correcting her and venting frustration towards the board.
At this point, it almost feels as though she is openly inviting ridicule while simultaneously pouring petrol onto an already furious fanbase.