The stark difference a week can make in the Premier League is astounding. Last weekend, the Boleyn Ground was aloft with the glory of defeating Chelsea 2-1. This week, the Hammers travel home with their tail in-between their legs after a 2-0 loss to Watford.
The consistency of the Hammers is the main target for Slaven Bilic before West Ham face off against Everton. Wins over Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester City, and Chelsea lose their luster when West Ham get outperformed for 80 minutes by Watford.
The pressure will be on Slaven Bilic and the Hammers to avoid any sign of a drop in form. Since last season’s remarkable plummet from fourth in the League at Christmas to a 12th place finish, any sign of faltering is cause for worry.
David Gold set the tone on Twitter post-match about the importance of next week’s match.
We’ve had 6 great wins but today we were well beaten helped by two individual defensive errors, now we must bounce back against Everton.”
Of course, Bilic knows this. As he told Match of the Day:
Basically, after ten minutes, from there to the end of the game we were basically second-best. They were better in every football department, and they totally deserved to beat us. We didn’t have energy. They were quicker than us, they were hungrier than us. Today it was just that.
Bilic went on to say:
I said to the players, this is Premier League, we’re going to lose games unfortunately And okay, I’m not happy when we’re losing games, but we can live with a defeat, but not in this way, because with the greatest respect to them, they are a good team – of course the other team is good – but we were sloppy. We at least helped them getting the victory easier than they should. But, that happened, okay, let’s be sure it was one-off.
Bilic may have been alluding to the gaffed clearance by Andy Carroll which led to the own-goal scored by Aaron Cresswell, as well as a poor clearance by James Tomkins, gifting Watford a two-goal advantage through Odion Ighalo just after the break.
Even with four forwards on the pitch by the 76th minute, West Ham were unable to get the ball in the back of the net at Vicarage Road. Everton travel to London next Saturday to play the Hammers, as West Ham aims to straighten out their play once more.
Even with the defeat, West Ham are fifth in the League and a win against Everton at the Boleyn Ground could amend the error, putting West Ham back into third.
As the Italian centre-back Angelo Ogbonna, who missed another match with a hamstring injury, said on Twitter:
Although the loss was poor, we hadn’t lost in 7 games, slip-ups can happen. The Hammers never give up! Catch you at the next home game!
