West Ham legend ‘Mad Dog’ Martin Allen sat down for an exclusive interview with Love Sport Radio, and delivered his verdict on David Moyes, Jarrod Bowen, Tomas Soucek and Sebastien Haller.
The Hammers are currently sitting inside the bottom three, one point adrift of safety, and things are looking bleak to say the least.
West Ham have some very hard games coming up, so the players will have to be on their very best form, if they are to move away from the relegation zone over the course of the next six weeks or so.
The Hammers did bring in some exciting new players in January, however. So all is not lost. Tomas Soucek arrived on loan from Slavia Prague, and the club have an option to buy the Czech midfielder in the summer.
Meanwhile, Jarrod Bowen arrived from Hull City for £22 million (The Guardian).
West Ham fans are hoping that the new signings will hit the ground running, and help bring out the best in misfiring striker Sebastien Haller.
And Mad Dog told Love Sport Radio how there are plenty of things to be positive about:
“Soucek, the central midfield player they just bought, he got forward and joined the front player. Haller played a lot better on Saturday.”
The Hammers legend also took time to praise the signing of Jarrod Bowen:
“He (Bowen) brings goals to the team. I’ve only seen him play once for Hull City about a month ago at Charlton away. It must be said during the first-half I didn’t even know he was playing. But two minutes after half-time, there he was getting between the centre-half and the full-back and tapping it in at the far post. And then after that in the second-half he was superb. The boy gets goals!”
And Allen suggested that there have been definite improvements since Moyes took over at West Ham:
“Yes definitely [an improvement]. People were critical of the West Brom Albion performance in the FA Cup but I wouldn’t really put that down as a good marker of judging performance levels as he made eight changes. You could say so did West Brom but the important thing to look at is the first-team.”
With games away at Manchester City and Liverpool next up on the agenda for West Ham, it could be a while before they climb out of the bottom three. But who knows? Football is a funny old game. If the Hammers players perform to their very best, they are more than capable of giving any team a game.
And a positive result against either City or Liverpool would go a long way to securing their Premier League status for another season.
Receive a digest of our best West Ham content each week direct to your mailbox
