FairWooney

Gray. Worked his arse off, did some good work in attack, at times doesn't look up to get the ball into the box, favouring looking to make himself a shot but did get some balls into the box also. Was up and down the pitch putting challenges and kept at it all game while others capitulated.

I would play him. He can stroll around by himself up front with not much to do for the most part so not too much running about all over. He is better at hold the ball up when we can get it out to him than Maupay and he is also better for defending set pieces. Added to that he's more likely to get in the right place and take a chance if we manage to get one. Give him 60 minutes or so and see how he's getting on. I'd rather that than throw him on towards the end of the game for a run out when the game is lost and he's then struggling to get up to speed with the action.

Aren't press conferences dull! 2 questions about Pele after the first one had clearly stated that he has no personal knowledge, was not old enough to watch him but can give a generic respectful answer! 2 questions about how great Haaland is! Only things we actually found out: DCL is in the squad Some of the players and manager are feeling a bit ill. On the DCL front I'd much rather have him feeding off scraps and holding the ball up when we mange to get it away from our area against City than Maupay but is it really worth throwing him into a game where he won't get a lot of action. You could say it's actually a better game to come back to. He won't be too active up front for most of the time so shouldn't be overworked and can be an important player defending set pieces. For those reasons I'd probably rather we start him then take him off when he's had enough (or is injured again!). Pickford Patterson Coady Tarks Mykolenko Onana Gueye Iwobi Gordon DCL Gray I am tempted to swap out one of the midfield players for an extra defender. Difficult to drop Gueye or Onana as they both are very capable defensively and putting in vital challenges. Iwobi hasn't been playing so well recently, would we miss him as an attacking out let here? The problem with playing 5 at the back is it can be easy to end up sat too deep with the 3 in midfield and support form the wingers you can look to keep City further away from goal. Random stat that may surprise a few: Onana has the most tackles for us this season but in 2nd place is Antony Gordon! His tackles have won the ball back 22 times this season. Interestingly he's actually made more tackles in the defensive 3rd than Onana maybe not a surprise I suppose as he is generally trying to win the ball back around the middle where as Gordon is supporting his full back.

I don't disagree that he was very much stuck in static 1 v 1's most of the time when trying to take players on. I think one of his qualities we saw last season, usually on the counter was his ability with his first touch or the way he turned his body to beat a defender who was at his heels when the ball was played to him or past him. I remember a few times where he had a lovely touch that left the defender for dead. Taking on a player head on is very different (I was a pacey winger and was hopeless at taking players on! In classic winger style if I had the run on a player I was fine!). The main positives I saw from Gordon in this game were when he came in side looking to break into the box, the chance that he squandered was a good run to find himself in good space. I do think our wingers would always rather not be out on the wing as they'd prefer to be coming inside, this kind of play is where we need better support from the wing backs to allow them come inside without us then lacking any width.

@Bailey In Fairness to Tarkowski he is pretty good at the Hollywood ball. With 97 completed at a completion rate of 61.4% it is a good 10% better than our average! That said 61% is pretty poor in terms of pass completion so while is getting us into a more attacking position 4 times out of 10, we are losing the ball the other 6 times! Coady has almost identical stats. Him playing the odd long ball isn't a problem but as you say the time spent dawdling on the ball without really having an eye for who's around him is more of a problem. The problem is two fold in that players aren't moving enough and showing that eagerness to get the ball and the player on the ball isn't sharp enough to spot and make a pass and thus ends up doing a turn on the half way line and going back to their other centre half. You can get players that are better more intelligent players who would improve the team but ultimately any reasonable Premiership player of which the players in our team are should be capable of these basics.

he was, stepped away from goal line but didn't watch the runner to his side. Was left neither covering the goal line or the running player when he came in.

looks to have decent pace, gets in good spots in the box and can finish well. Also a few goals where he showed good strength holding off the defender. A few that I saw were very much championship level fails by keeper or defenders but he took his chances. Seems to link up well as well, quite often involved in the build up then gets himself in the right spot. None of their goals that I watched were crosses which is maybe contrary to how we've played with DCL. Coventry appear to play on the break quite a bit with fast pace attacks (just how we have had success in the past but then revert away from it!). for the price he's worth a go.

6 attempted dribbles, none successful from him Passing wise he completed just 1 pass in the final 1/3rd of the pitch. Really not good enough for a player in his position

just listened to the interview with Tarkowski. Slight complaint from him at the fans calling for them to get the ball forward and saying we want to play the ball out from the back and that's how we're going to keep playing. That'd be fine if the players in front of him actually gave him good movement. Just rewatched the goal also and disappointed by Patterson's running back, perhaps he was blowing after his run into attack at the end of a game but given that he was alongide the goalscorer 25 yards out from their goal and was left for dead he'll be very disappointed in himself. Watched the replay a few times and appalled at the effort to get back from some of the players, Iwobi was in a fairly good position to get back and assist and is apparently our fasted player but put in a lazy jog on the way back getting overtaken by Mykolenko who started 10 metres behind him! Likewise Onana could have got himself back quicker. It's a criticism of one important moment in the match and I can understand a little bit of tiredness in a first game back at the end but having played it round so slowly for large parts they should have been able to produce some desperate running when required at the end.

I missed half of the first half but thought that half looked very open, we had a few squandered chances with Gordon and Maupay not making the most of good opportunities. Both teams were full of errors, especially Wolves giving the ball away in dangerous areas with sloppy touches but we never capitalised. Second half we seemed to have control for most of the half without really creating much. We had 59% possession but they were generally well organised and we just lack ideas. Actually though the levels of the 2 teams doesn't compare, the England v France game looked very similar at times. The centre backs in that game spent too much time sideways passing as France held a good solid set up while the French looked dangerous on the counter. It is very hard to break through a team that has 2 good lines set up but our lack of any movement or midfield showing for the ball really shows up when a team is well set up like this. Onana and Gueye need to be finding space and looking to take the ball on, sometimes it will need to return again but that gets things moving around more than just going side to side. The wingers need to be either looking to make a run or dropping back to show for the ball and the full backs need to offer more (admittedly Patterson at the end was absent because of a forward run but there was plenty behind him to cover). I'm really disappointed that it's not working for Lampard and his team at the moment, it seemed like he had a good team of coaches around him who could all offer help in different areas but certainly, in attack we're not seeing any improvement. The players might be not be the best but with good coaching they should definitely look like they have more idea than they have done. Whenever you see training videos they always seem to be working on tight space quick movement passing yet when confronted by it in a game the players are all stood still. That's a level of intensity they're missing when stood at Goodison in front of 40,000 that they seem to have when out on a pitch with the coaches around them.

disappointing that as he was showing that he could be a good option in midfield and could offer more than Gueye in the middle. Could be a chance for Price after his good couple of games on the Aus tour.

to sit on the bench? he's not going to get near the starting 11 for them any time soon

I hope Lampard plans to use the next 6 weeks with most of his squad very wisely as we have a lot to work on. Particularly how he can get the team creating more chances and scoring more goals. Hopefully Onana and Gueye are fit. want too see more decisive forward play, we might not have the most creative players but we have plenty enough to know how to play the ball forward, look to bring attackers in to play and get shots off. patterson has to start, he was our most positive attacking threat on Tuesday and give so much more balance. pickford patterson Coady Tarks. Myk Onana. Garner Iwobi gordon. Maupay. Gray maybe switch one of the middle guys with Gueye, but need some discipline from a middle 2 to allow Patterson and Mykolenko a bit of attacking freedom. Not confident at all but really hope we can sign off with 3 points

11 changes, on the plus side we never even used to have enough players to do that! only 3 of Saturdays 11 on the bench as well! I don't mind that and don't mind the 3-5-2, wouldn't be against us giving it another go in the league as our current 4-3-3 doesn't seem to be getting us much going forward. Patterson and Vinagre both capable of causing them problems down the wings. My concern would be not having an experienced centre back to cover Mina's likely injury mid game! Given that none of the 3 have played in a long time and 2 of them have been injured it's quite a risk to not have any experienced defenders on the bench.

I'd play the same team as last game or possibly Gordon back in for McNeil. Great news that DCL is in line to be in the squad, hopefully that comes through and he is on the bench on Sunday. I'd be happy to see him get 15-20 minutes at the end (putting in defensive headers and holding the ball up up the field as we defend our lead!). Going to say 1-0 win. Plenty of blocked chances but we keep them out. Goal for Onana

great news. Hopefully we'll have him back for a few games before the break. Need to be careful not to rush him back in but would be good to get a few games during a busy November before he gets a break .

Recommended by Tosun probably! We've done a fine job getting a "partner" for everything now. Hair, tyres, watches..... Wonder how much we actually get from any of these things as I doubt most of them will get that much advertising apart from linking to us and their name in programme's here and there.

fair enough makes sense. Hopefully no more issues and he can get a good run through till Christmas now.

anyone know why he wasn't in the squad on Sunday? I'd heard he was supposed to be in then something about complications with his injury or something. Hopefully whatever the reason it wasn't anything that will hold him back and a couple more weeks training can bring him back fully fit and ready to get going

Just noticed Gordon has 4 yellow cards already! 1 away from a suspension after just 7 matches! I thought the one he got on Sunday was a bit soft though, Patterson put in a challenge and he came through afterwards, the comms had no idea who was getting the yellow till it was confirmed!

Love this, he looks so calm when on the ball and always looking quickly for who's available for a pass. Almost all of his passes are forward passes as well. Great work for the goal as well, starts things off in the middle with the ball out to Mykolenko, and settles initially in to a defensive position to cover Myk but then spots the space to run into to receive the ball again where he can drive forward and pick out Maupay. Really good awareness.

He put in some good defensive work in both halves though you're right as I remember it was always on the right hand side. Did work hard defensively I thought though did nothing in attack today.

West Ham are one of only 3 teams to have had less possession so far this season so I'd really like to see us dominate the game with Iwobi and Onana looking to take control of things in the middle and feeding the attackers as much as possible with plenty of assistance from the wing backs. In fairness to their poor form they did give Chelsea a very tough game, despite only having 31% possession they only lost 2-1 conceding on 88 minutes and having what i've heard was a very legitimate goal overturned. We will need to work hard to create chances against them and I'm hoping we start to see the way we want to be playing and creating chances.

3 points. I think put them away, West Ham have started the season poorly especially considering how good they were last season. They are 4th from bottom for shots per game which is reflected in them only scoring 3 goals so far this season. That said we've only scored 4 but have had a lot more chances than they have. The extra week of preparation has probably been good for us, whilst Pickford is still out it has given Calvert-Lewin an extra week following his return to full training. Given his recent injury issues I'd be inclined to start him on the bench giving Maupay a second start after a decent first game and bring DCL on in the second half. Begovic Patterson Coady Tarkowski Mykolenko Gana Iwobi Onana McNeil Maupay Gordon Great to have some options available now with Gray and DCL both very capable of winning a game for us. I'm going for 2-0 win, Gordon and DCL.

Enjoyed seeing Gordon get a bit of personal training work with Lampard and Cole, working on turning the defender (Cole himself) and getting the shot off. Not too dissimilar to to some of the other drills but he was getting that as an extra whilst the others were all doing cool down runs.