Pablo Felipe still doesn't have a West Ham goal to his name. Depending on who you ask, that's either an indictment of a big-money striker signing or a footnote to a much bigger problem. However, if you just base it by results, this is a different West Ham squad when he's in the starting eleven.
This season alone, West Ham have won three matches across all competitions, and Pablo has started two of them. Zoom out further, back to his January arrival from Gil Vicente, and the picture gets even more striking: West Ham have picked up 12 wins in all competitions since he signed, and Pablo has been in the starting lineup for nine of those twelve. That's a 75% presence rate in the club's victories over that stretch, for a player who's never been treated as an automatic first name on the team sheet.
West Ham haven't played an even split of matches with and without him, and correlation isn't the same as proof that he's the direct cause of the positive results. But a 75% hit rate in a club's wins, for a striker who hasn't scored, is the kind of stat that should make people stop and ask what exactly he's contributing that isn't showing up on the scoresheet.
Let's be honest about the tension here. If you're picking a centre-forward purely on end product, Pablo's case is weak. West Ham bought him for a £20 million fee and are still waiting for his first West Ham goal months into his time at the club. In a results business, that's a legitimate mark against him, and it's fair for supporters to want more end product from a striker in a promotion-chasing side.
When you watch him for ninety minutes, it's hard not to notice all the other little things that make it worth it. Pablo does the parts of centre-forward play that don't show up in a highlight reel. He pulls defenders out of position, he wins the physical battles, he presses relentlessly even when the ball is nowhere near him, and he creates space for the players around him to do the scoring. Against Wolves, he set up Kyle Walker-Peters with a clever chipped pass and dragged two defenders out of position to open the lane for Divine Mukasa's second goal. No goal or assist was officially credited to him for that second one, but the buildup doesn't happen without him occupying the space he did. That's the profile of a player whose value often gets undersold by a stat sheet: a battering ram who makes everyone else's job easier.
There's also something to be said for what he represents beyond the tactical detail. Pablo has been open about wanting to leave everything on the pitch for this club, and it shows. He plays like a striker with something to prove, not a marquee signing coasting on reputation. In a Championship season where West Ham have needed identity and fight as much as quality, that counts for something. Fans who were quick to write him off earlier in the year have started to come around, and results like these are exactly why.
None of this means Pablo shouldn't be pushed to add goals to his game. Nuno Espírito Santoit's said about Pablo after Tuesday’s win, “He played a good game, and he’s still chasing his goal. We trust his confidence, and it's going to come soon.” At some point, a striker at this level needs to start scoring, and that conversation isn't going away. But the idea that he's not earning his place is getting harder to defend when the team simply wins more with him on the pitch. Whatever the reason: the pressing, the buildup play, the sheer force of will West Ham are a better side with Pablo in it, and right now, that matters more than a blank in the goals column.
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