- West Ham have to win on the last day to stay in the Premier League
- The Hammers still need Tottenham Hotspur to lose on the final day
- Jarrod Bowen admits this fight has been coming for a long time
West Ham United will go into the last day of the Premier League season needing three points and Tottenham Hotspur to lose, if they want to stay in the top flight next season. The Hammers need the great escape to avoid playing in the Championship next season.
Captain Jarrod Bowen has been at the club long enough to know exactly what it means to play for West Ham, but admitted to Sky Sports that a relegation scrap has been a long-time coming for the Irons.
“I think you’ve got to look at that because it’s been three years this summer since we won a European trophy. Even that season, we finished 14th, we weren’t that great.
“The season after we finished up in the top half of the table and from then, we finished 15th last season. We weren’t great, but we got ourselves out of it.
“It’s not like this season has just come straightaway. It was starting to creep in a little bit last season. But we thought we’d be better this season. Obviously, we had a new manager, then we changed manager after a few games.
“New players coming in. You never want to sit here and give excuses. That’s not what I’m about because ultimately it’s us. It’s all on us. We’re the ones that play.
“You can be set up in a way that you can do things. But when you cross that line, it’s your 11 players on the pitch against their 11 players on the pitch. That’s ultimately what it is. And we just haven’t played well enough. We haven’t been good enough as a group.”
Jarrod Bowen says his performances are part of West Ham’s downfall
At present, Bowen had the most goal involvements of any Englishman in the Premier League, but has gone missing at the business end of the season. Despite having still posted significant statistics, the 29-year-old has not hit the standards he holds himself to, and knows it has contributed to West Ham’s position.
“I haven’t played to the standards that I know that I can,” he said. “I’m big enough to accept that. I just haven’t played well enough.”
Bowen knows as captain of this club he has to perform and whilst he can be better, hopes he has still done enough to make Thomas Tuchel’s England squad.
“It’s probably one of the biggest weeks in my career,” he said. “So it would be wrong for me to start looking past into the next few weeks and start putting my energy elsewhere.
“I love this club. I have a lot of care for this club. So I want to put all my energy into this week.
“A lot of stuff gets printed. That’s what happens in social media and in newspapers these days. A lot of false things get put out there.
“When there’s time to speak and time to address different things, then it will come from me because that’s how I work.
“I’m quite honest. I’m quite open. I’ll always address different sorts of things. But for me now, my energy has to be into this week. There’s no other way.”
