Saints ended their losing streak against the Hammers, in the main they looked comfortable, but there was a worrying lack of clear cut chances and also a tendency to go to sleep and gift the opposition chances.

Danny Ings was back and although Saints lacked nothing in terms of determination, organisation and application in the absence of the self Isolating Ralph Hasenhuttl, in the final third they just couldn't break down the Hammers who had set out their stall to hold what they had and then see if they could nick something at set pieces or on the break.

We dominated with possession having 63% of the ball, but tellingly West Ham equalled us in the shots on goal and on target tally and that in itself tells a story.

It could have been different, Danny Ings scored a superb goal, but it was disallowed by VAR, in fairness no one could have any complaints, Che Adams was a good yard offside in the build up to make it 3 goals in 2 games ruled out for offside.

But chances were sadly too few throughout the game, our build up play was good but too often we failed to capitalise, Theo Walcott made some good runs , but always seemed to lose control of the ball at some point, his pace seemed to be too quick for his ball control, Danny Ings and Che Adams were isolated and Moussa Djenepo struggled to take players on and either have shots or create chances, even when a good chance from a free kick materialised JWP put it over.

So from the point of view of injuries and the manager not being able to be there, this was a good display, but at the other end of the field we kept a clean sheet, but that easily could not have been the case.

At set pieces too often West Ham got a free header in and they could have won the ball when we failed to deal with a ball into the box and it presented Benrahma with a shot from close range that left Alex McCarthy needing to make a great save to make sure that we got a point from a game that we had rarely looked like losing.

It was hard to put your finger on why we lacked inspiration in the final third, perhaps Danny Ings knew he wasn't 100%, certainly he didn't impose himself in the game as he did before his knee injury, but it wasn't for a lack of trying.

It was a game in which we just needed a strike of luck to break down the Hammers steely resistance.

This means that of late our form hasn't been great, 9 points from the last 6 games is the par score we want, but only 2 points from the last 3 games is not good enough, on one hand we have achieved them in adversity, so the plus point is that in the past we would perhaps have lost all 3 games, but our standards are higher now.

But we have to get back to winning ways sooner than later if we are to stay in the top 10 or higher going forward, from that point of view we are still only 3 points behind Leicester in 3rd.

The games will come thick and fast now, by the end of January it will be essentially the start of it in terms of the number of games we have played in previous seasons, we will then be able to judge if we are still in the running for a European place or whether it will be mid table for us, hopefully we have come through a poor run with only 1 defeat, we can build on this and start to march forward again.

Photo: Action Images

sidsaint added 18:03 - Dec 31 Thanks Whatsforpud. Sorry for error, forgot we had 3 at home on the bounce.
0

sidsaint added 21:56 - Dec 31 Thanks Whatsforpud for pointing out the error. I had forgotten we had 3 home games on the bounce.
0

Peterx added 05:10 - Jan 1 We have had the ball in the oppositions net 3 times in the last 2 games, all ruled out, so I believe our goal threat is still there. If Danny's had not been ruled for build-up offside it would have been a Saints goal of the season contender and would have opened the game up for us. Similarly the game against Fulham would have assumed a totally different character if we had gone one up. Also JWP knows that the keepers all know he is most effective at hitting Top Left of the goal so he needed to mix it up, went top right but his worst free kick for a while. We have looked abysmal against West Ham in recent seasons, in this game we dominated possession and gave as good as we got although not our most entertaining game of the season. To me we are missing Redmond's ball carrying presence on the left the sooner he is back the better, Moussa can do some of this but not as rounded as Redmond. Similarly on the right Armstrong has been looking leggy, we need him back to his best starting games and going on his mazy runs. This point keeps us in touch.

1

Waylander added 22:30 - Jan 1 Wet Spam just beat Everton at Goodison by nicking a late goal. Makes our result look decent.
0

Blogs 31 bloggers

Bristol Rovers Polls