West Ham vs. Leicester City – The oppositions view
By Adam Smith
By now we know a lot about what Leicester City offer as an opponent for West Ham. What we don’t know is what Leicester City fans think of the Irons, and what they think their Foxes need to focus on when coming up against us – until now!
Friend and fellow FanSided writer Harneet Singh Sethi of the FoxesofLeicester.com has provided us with some intel from the opposition’s view for this upcoming match. He covers who/what about West Ham makes Leicester fans jealous, and how they can contend with the inconsistent attack West Ham will put forward.
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"“West Ham United are one of the few teams that I just don’t know what to expect from, the reason being that they have a myriad of top players, who are all notoriously inconsistent. On their day, they can fire you to a win over Manchester United, but they can fire a shambolic blank against Brighton and Hove Albion, too.In what is, by and large, an enigmatic team, the one area that possesses relatively more consistency is the defence. Had I said that at the end of matchday 3, I’d have been guilty of heresy; however, at the moment, that is not the case. In Fabian Balbuena and Issa Diop, Manuel Pellegrini has found a centre-back pairing that a lot of teams in the division would be happy – and proud – to have. Add the forever young Pablo Zabaleta to that, and we are looking at a well protected goal.However, when I look at the other half of the pitch, I see problems – which, to be honest, doesn’t surprise me. Felipe Anderson and Marko Arnautovic are two remarkably fugacious players, and to get them to play well every week – especially Anderson – is a tougher task than winning an argument against Jose Mourinho. I like Andriy Yarmolenko more than I do these two, but now that he’s injured as well, who can Pellegrini absolutely invest his faith in is an interesting question.”"
There you have it, from the fox’s mouth – and it’s a fair assessment, too. West Ham’s offense has been extremely unreliable and unpredictable this season which is a reason for concern. Leicester fans know that if they ignore or look passed Arnautovic and Anderson they’ll get burned, so counting them out due to inconsistency could play into West Ham’s hand, even with Yarmolenko out with injury.
Harneet also appropriately assessed the Hammers defense. He praised the centre-back pairing that has surpassed early expectations, credit to Zabaleta for being in top shape and still an effective Premier League player at his age and then provided the appropriate deafening silence about the left-back position.
Everton knew to attack that side, Brighton knew how to victimize the poor coverage from left-back, and Tottenham utilized the open swinging door that Cresswell was supposed to man as well. It’s far from a secret that West Ham are weak in that position, and aptly, the appraisal of West Ham’s solid D has passed without mention of anything positive from the left side.
One aspect of this match that was not mentioned was that West Ham are away to Leicester City. Last season West Ham ended the 2017/18 campaign with a big 2-0 win at Leicester with goals from Joao Mario and a superb volley from Noble. West Ham have started to look solid at the London Stadium but away from their home, they tend to be a little more dangerous. Everton were surprised by West Ham’s attack in the 3-1 Hammers win and I think Leicester could fall into that category as well.