Julen Lopetegui on the brink at West Ham as Ruud van Nistelrooy kickstarts Leicester reign

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Evening Standard

·3 décembre 2024

Julen Lopetegui on the brink at West Ham as Ruud van Nistelrooy kickstarts Leicester reign

The Hammers boss faces a nervous wait with Wolves next up on Monday

In football there are comings and there are goings, but rarely both at the same time.

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Might this have been one of those moments? Will Ruud van Nistelrooy’s first match in charge of Leicester prove to have been Julen Lopetegui’s last in charge of West Ham?

Quite what Tuesday night’s bitterly disappointing 3-1 defeat at a bitterly cold King Power Stadium means for Lopetegui's future will become clear in the coming days, but it can’t be good.

Here was the start of a supposedly presentable run of fixtures leading into Christmas, a potential lifeline that could lift the Basque boss free from the pressure he is under.

Instead, time now moves more quickly. Will those games still be his to take charge of after this? The West Ham board have plenty to ponder before Wolves come to town on Monday, and very little of it is positive in tone.

After Bobby De Cordova-Reid scored to make it 3-0 (a goal later disallowed for offside), the chants of “you’re getting sacked in the morning” rang out around the ground loud and clear, directed at a man whose body language all night was nervy and negative.

Another question: can a team rain down a record number of shots on their opponents’ goal and still not have played well?

Yes. Having tested the patience of their fanbase all season, Lopetegui’s side are testing the realms of possibility now too.

The 20 shots they registered in the first half was a Premier League record for the Hammers, and yet the only clinical strike was one of Leicester’s measly three — scored by Jamie Vardy inside two minutes and setting West Ham on the way to a damaging defeat.

Lopetegui made a raft of changes for this game, dropping Emerson for Vladimir Coufal — who played backwards constantly — and moving Aaron Wan-Bissaka onto the left, where he was significantly less effective. Danny Ings started in favour of Michail Antonio but only lasted 45 minutes.

West Ham’s utterly torrid centre-back pairing of Dinos Mavropanos and Max Kilman never learned from the lesson Vardy gave them after a mere 98 seconds, when he took advantage of their lax high line to run in behind and score.

The Hammers’ passing in the final third was often just too intricate, and Leicester tore away at real pace. The centre-backs were exposed, and then disposed of, first by Vardy, then by Bilal El Khannouss, and finally by substitute Patson Daka.

That Niclas Fullkrug came on in the 79th minute and scored his first goal for West Ham, following three months out injured, was the tiniest of silver linings. He then missed a golden chance for a second deep into injury time.

But this was a grim night for West Ham. It could prove to be terminal for their manager.