The Premier League Panel: Who's to blame for West Ham's recent troubles?

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Our expert panel looks at whether Graham Potter can turn things around at West Ham and wonders what changes need to be made to the squad.

Transcript

00:00When you talk about the players not sort of getting the message,

00:02how much of the blame do you think lies at the feet of Lopetegui for that?

00:05And how much sort of falls to the current squad?

00:09I think it's probably a bit of both.

00:11I think that the key thing that we noticed as fans was that

00:17he was very one-dimensional and very stubborn

00:20in terms of the way you wanted the team to play.

00:23And there was no, okay, well, this isn't working, let's change it.

00:28We're too far up the field, we're playing too far of a high line

00:31and it's exposing us too much.

00:33The players aren't suited to what I'm asking them to do.

00:35Let's just calm it down a little bit.

00:37Let's just have a little bit of a deeper line,

00:39play a little bit more conservatively.

00:42So that's Lopetegui's fault, essentially.

00:46But then there were times, there have been times

00:47at the first of the season where we did feel

00:49as if the players probably could have been giving a little bit more.

00:52But essentially, if players have been played out of position

00:55or in the case of Aaron Wan-Bissaka,

00:57being told to essentially play as a right winger

01:00as opposed to a right back,

01:03he's just doing what he's been told to do.

01:05So I think the majority of the blame

01:07does land at Lopetegui's door, essentially.

01:11I mean, Dylan, do you think looking back

01:13that the club made a mistake by getting rid of David Moyes?

01:16I think a lot of us who looked at it

01:17from a neutral perspective at the time

01:19couldn't help but wondering whether it was a case

01:21of being careful what you wish for.

01:23Is that just 20-20 hindsight talking?

01:26It kind of feels like it.

01:28Thinking from an outsider perspective,

01:31it kind of seemed a strange decision to get rid of Moyes

01:34in the sense of, granted,

01:36the football wasn't always particularly attractive

01:38and I think maybe that's what possibly pushed him

01:41to make that decision.

01:42But he'd had a lot of success at West Ham.

01:45He obviously took them to win the Europa Conference League

01:48and it's not exactly like they had a bad season last year.

01:51So I think it was a gamble by the ownership

01:55and maybe they thought by bringing in Lopetegui

01:58that they could try and play

02:00some more sort of expansive, entertaining football,

02:03which I think a lot of the fans wanted.

02:06But it really didn't turn out like that

02:08and it kind of felt inevitable

02:09that he was going to get sacked.

02:10It always seemed like a question of when rather than if.

02:13And I suppose the hope is that maybe Graham Potter

02:18can try and bring some of that more attractive football

02:21he played at Brighton to West Ham.

02:24But yeah, it did seem a strange decision for Moyes to go.

02:27But that's the decision they made

02:30and I suppose now they're facing the consequences of it

02:32with what happened with Lopetegui.

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