Aside from a five-minute spell from just before West Ham scored our first goal until right after our second, Arsenal made us look amateurish on so many occasions.
Gary Neville admitted that he was shocked to see us play out from the back so haphazardly, especially against a team that presses like Arsenal.
It was an embarrassing performance at the London Stadium from the Hammers.
Yes, Arsenal are a fantastic team but we showed them far too much respect, and that must have stemmed from Julen Lopetegui.
The Hammers head coach is a man under real pressure yet again, with Tuesday’s game against Leicester now an absolute must-win.
The really concerning thing about this season is the amount of hammerings we’ve had.
5-1 at Liverpool, 4-1 at Tottenham, 3-0 at home to Chelsea, 3-0 at Nottingham Forest and now 5-2 against Arsenal.
I wonder what the Hammers owners were really thinking about Lopetegui last night? I truly believe he’s one game away from the sack now.
West Ham fans won’t believe Julen Lopetegui’s Arsenal analysis
The Spaniard has seriously underperformed in his role as Hammers head coach.
He signed many top-class players in the summer, but he really hasn’t been able to get a tune out of them.
And they certainly haven’t gelled together as a unit yet.
Lopetegui addressed the media after our embarrassing 5-2 defeat to Arsenal on Saturday night.
The Spaniard responded when asked by WHUFC.com what he thought of the performance, and the West Ham fans will be gobsmacked after hearing his comments.
Lopetegui said, “It was a very strange first half above all. I think that when you see the score, 2-5, you think that it has been an incredible storm, but it wasn’t like that.“
“I think that it happened in a lot of little details. We didn’t do well, it’s true that we have to do better, but [they have scored] with two penalties, one set-piece action. I think that it was very, very close with [Lucas] Paquetá [being fouled on the corner when Gabriel scored the first goal].“
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“We have to review all our understanding about the rules. That was very, very clear in my opinion. And that was the first goal, I think that it was tough for us.“
“I’m very sad, and then suddenly the second goal, I think it was an action that we had to defend better. “
“There was energy about us after the second goal by Emerson, thinking that with one goal more we are very close to getting back level.“
“And the fifth goal with one very, very soft action for the penalty, when Lukasz said he touched the ball. I think that we were unlucky with the decisions, in my opinion, the first goal and with the fifth goal.“
“It’s very difficult to compete when being three goals down, but I think that the players did well in the second half.“
Wow!
What a terrible, and quite frankly worrying take that is from the gaffer.
West Ham could have lost by eight to Arsenal
Whilst I think the two penalties we conceded were soft, they were the correct decisions.
We would have fully expected them to be given to us, had the incidents occurred at the other end of the pitch.
Some fans are forgetting about the decision to award us a free-kick inside the first-half as well – one that Emerson Palmieri scored from.
It was a clean challenge from Declan Rice and the free-kick definitely shouldn’t have been awarded by referee Anthony Taylor.
The bottom line is that West Ham were quite simply awful against Arsenal, from start to finish, and I don’t want to hear any excuses from Julen Lopetegui anymore.
I’m sick and tired of hearing him say the same thing week in, week out after a defeat.
The talking has to stop – more action is needed. However, the thing that really concerns me after the Arsenal defeat is that Julen Lopetegui seems delusional.
West Ham have to improve ten-fold against Leicester, but I fear that Lopetegui doesn’t think we were that bad against Arsenal!
