Carlton Cole consistently receives mixed opinions from us hammers, may hate him for his lacklustre, lazy and undetermined playing style, whilst others love him, but why, simply because he took a pay cut.
Loyalty in football has been massively decreasing from the days of Paolo Di Canio whom rejected a Manchester United move in favour of staying with his beloved Hammers, and Carlton Cole is one of few professionals in today’s game that would see his wage be slashed in order to stay with the club he sees as home.
Carlton, without doubt, is nowhere near one of the best attacking players in the footballing game, and this is underlined by the fact he doesn’t seem to try. Clumsy and lazy, all he seems to do be doing is being caught offside or conceding a foul. However, Carlton Cole, alongside Piqiounne and Maiga, are the only strikers that are on our books, as our players, and with Cole’s contract set to expire, we must wonder what’s going to happen.
In the wake of our relegation two seasons ago, many players skipped boat as soon as possible, but the likes of Cole, and Green stayed on, in order to help the Hammer’s reach success and claim their premier league spot back. Cole took a huge wage cut during this time in order to stay with West Ham, and many hammer’s, including myself admire him for doing so, whilst the likes of Scott Parker moved to our rivals, Tottenham.
Cole isn’t the best of players, however, his loyalty should be respected, and maybe this should earn him a new contract, however, I feel that being the nice guy doesn’t help, and if your bad at your job then you shouldn’t be hired any longer, and surely this is the case with Cole, who rarely scores goals.
So, I’ve probably annoyed a few of you already, but the fact is, as a premier league team, we need to be scoring goals, not taking wage cuts. Wage cuts don’t win three points. Wage cuts don’t win titles, or silverware. No!
As much as I like Cole for the man he is, he simply isn’t good enough, he rarely scores, and rarely provides, and the only reason many of you like you, is for his goal and assists in the Play-Off final, yes I agree, thank you Carlton, but a goal and assist in the league below is nothing, especially when he doesn’t provide in the league we are in, the league we belong in.
In my opinion, if Sam Allardyce renews Carlton’s contract, then we have no ambition, we need a goal-scorer, and we need one now, before the transfer window shuts. The depressing thing that gets me is that Reading’s substitute, Adam Le Fondre has more goals, and does this not smack you Carlton lovers in the face?
We need a change, and with our current, poor performances, it is integral, and we need it now.
Andy Carroll is the same, yes, he has scored one goal, but the trouble he causes when he plays puts the opposition under threat, thus bringing the best out of Nolan whom loves to play on other team’s nerves. I really like Carroll, but alike Cole, he just doesn’t score, hopefully, when he is fit, he does, but for now, we need to experiment with the players we have, such as Maiga, who is our only hope for the future, regarding attackers, because Piquionne won’t be playing, hopefully anyway.
Strikers are needed, and we don’t need the likes of aerial dominance that we already have in Cole and Carroll, we need a finisher, a goal scorer, someone who knows where the goal is and can grab us that equaliser when we don’t deserve it, but who could it be? And will Sam ever use him? Probably not, we signed Maynard and Baldock last season, and they were played out wide, which will probably happen with this goal scorer, if we ever sign one.
Do we avoid relegation this season; my vote would go towards Jordan Rhodes whom we missed out on. He knows where the goal is, and as well as this, he is young, in my opinion, he will thrive at West ham, but time will tell, and so will Cole.
What is your opinion on our striker crisis? And do you think Cole deserves a contract renewal?