Don't Look Now.... West Ham Ladies Hit Swindon for 5

What a difference a week makes. Only seven days previous West Ham Ladies had been consigned to their sixth defeat in a row by the unrelenting Lewes Ladies in the unrelenting south coast drizzle, in the process only managing two shots on target, yet on Sunday in the autumn sunshine at their new temporary home Rush Green, managed to produce an entertaining display of free flowing, high scoring football against bottom club Swindon Ladies.
  And they earned it. Swindon made them work hard for the victory. There were no glaring defensive errors made by the visitors to hand goals on a silver platter.
Each goal was unique in it's own way.

The first a result of Molly Peters' bravery. The second a first time long ball (yes a long ball. I couldn't believe it either) to Molly Peters who finished from a very acute angle. The third an instinctive first time shot under pressure from Paige Anderson-James.

 The fourth a twenty five yard thunderbolt/exocet/rocket (or all three) from Paige again, which on further viewings gets better and better and more unbelievable. The fifth and final goal a composed finish from sixteen year old Kelly Wealthall, taking the ball around the keeper before cooly placing it in the net. Kelly is such an exciting prospect, great positional awareness, a tough tackler and knows where the goal is. She is definitely one to watch.
  What made the victory even sweeter, was that there was a crowd to witness it. To applaud it. To appreciate it. About 100 spectators (101 if you include West Ham keeper Cherie Rowlands)  cheered every good play, oohed and ahhed every near miss and  punched the air with a hooray at every goal. There's no sound quite like the sound of cheers. Especially if they are aimed in your direction. You could see the joy spreading through the team after a year of disappointment after disappointment.
David Sullivan also attended to cast an eye over his investment and to support the Ladies. Bafflingly he'd come dressed head to foot in Swindon's colours. Someone whispered to me, 'Don't look now.'
I didn't know whether he was telling me not to stare, or that he was referring to the villain in the movie. I wish (or is it wished?) Mr Sullivan would come to every match as he is the Ladies talisman with a 100% witness win rate.
It was a pleasure to watch the players being able to express themselves as an attacking force, freed from the chains of the tedious sideways passing possession nonsense previously chosen as the main tactic. It would great if the Ladies could impose their attacking flair onto Charlton Ladies on Wednesday night, throwing caution to the wind (maybe hanging onto a bit of caution i.e. chaperone ex-West Ham, goal machine Charlotte Gurr ) and giving it a right go, rendering Mr Watts bell utterly redundant.
 It's getting like the Stepford Wives. West Ham Ladies have WSL1 in their sights. It is coming around quicker than this year's Christmas. Is the team gradually being replaced? Is it the Ship of Theseus? or Trigger's broom even?

This week's new signing/wife was Rosie Kmita. I thought it was Molly. They look the same. They are twins ...but they even play the same fast tenacious game with a smile and  a swagger. It would be interesting to see them play together, their pace would frighten the life out of the opposition, and at the same time give the crowd an opportunity to play a life size game of 'Spot the Difference.'

Next stop... Into the Valley

COYLI

West Ham Ladies and the WSL1

Does anyone remember those old ‘Good News Bad News’ jokes?

West Ham United Ladies General Manager Karen Ray (as she likes to be referred to): Ladies… I’ve got some good news…. and I’ve got some bad news. What do you want first?

West Ham United Ladies: (in unison) WHAT’S THE BAD NEWS?

West Ham United Ladies General Manager Karen Ray: We don’t have a clue about tactics or formations and we haven’t got a Scooby about what our best team is. The likelihood is that we will finish second bottom of the league by the grace of Swindon who are so (hang on the O to emphasise) so (and again) bad.

West Ham United Ladies: (in unison) OH!  SO WHAT’S THE GOOD NEWS THEN?

West Ham United Ladies General Manager Karen Ray: We’re going to be playing in the WSL1 next season.

Bizarrely, that is a genuine possibility and not a joke. The news this week coming from the FA is there is going to be a restructure of the Women’s League designed to create a top tier Super League comprising of the fourteen teams with the most moolah and the ability to comply implicitly with the FA’s rules, regulations and stipulations. Apparently in November the teams already in WSL1 and 2 can apply for a ‘licence’ to play in the Creme deal Creme league, and if there are any spaces left other clubs from the soon to be ‘cardigans for goalposts’ leagues they can apply March 2018, leaving just the close season to go from Am to Pro.

West Ham Ladies have announced their intentions to go for one of those vacant slots, and if successful, they will kick off next season in WSL1. A scary but exciting prospect for the club, manager/s and players alike…. or maybe just for the club.

West Ham United Ladies General Manager Karen Ray’s much vaunted ‘Five year rags to riches vision’ to ascend to the dizzy heights of the WSL1  looks like having four years knocked off it in one fell swoop.

The formation of the new WSL1 league requires teams to commit to having full-time professional playing staff delivering a minimum of 16 hours of daytime contact per week, as well as an elite performance environment including strength and conditioning, performance preparation, medical and player welfare. 

The new proposals throw up more questions than answers.

16 hours doesn’t seem very much for a full-time occupation. Do the 16hours include match days?

If you have an away fixture at say Manchester City ( hells bells) the 16 hours would almost all be consumed in one day. Some of our Ladies have good careers….. is there a way that they could do both?

Allegedly there have been some enquiries from some WSL players already with a view to signing for West Ham. Where does that leave the players that have ‘bought into’ the five year plan?

And what happens if West Ham are not granted a licence or there are no spaces to be had? With the reshuffle of the leagues…. instead of going up two divisions, they could find themselves in the division below.

So where does that leave the coaches and playing staff? 

No matter how much the club spin and sugar coat the facts, the fact is it has taken West Ham United (proper) a year in charge to win one solitary single league match, and as a West Ham Ladies fan, that has been pretty hard to endure. 

Whoever is in charge of team selection (it’s either team manager Greg de Carnys or West Ham United Ladies General Manager Karen Ray or both) doesn’t seem to know their best team. The line up is shuffled more times than a deck in Vegas, and players disappear unannounced more times than Debbie Mcgee during a matinee seaside spectacular, and others are signed in a kind of Supermarket Sweep panic buy kind of fashion.

Their latest arrival though was like a breath of fresh air. She’d been out of football for two years and on Thursday she attended her first training session. Shirvae Edwards. When her name was mentioned it was music to my ears (Burn/Deep Purple). I was ecstatic with the news. I had often encouraged her on social media to get her footy boots back on, now finally she had and I couldn’t wait to see her silky skills back on a pitch.

Shirvae Edwards

Surprisingly I didn’t have to wait long. Just three days later Shirvae was in the starting line up. Understandably she wasn’t match fit and lasted the pre planned 30 minutes before making way for promising young talent Kelly Wealthall. In those 30 minutes though we saw glimpses of Shirvae’s natural ability with her deft touches and intelligent flicks, but she had no support. She had been given solitary confinement in the Lewes half of the pitch whilst her team mates were busy parking the bus up the other end. Maybe … just maybe .. it would've been a more astute decision to give her the final 30 minutes enabling her to shine against a tiring defence on a wet heavy pitch. 

But what do I know….

                                                       

The game was lost by giving the ball away too often and not learning from last season’s fixture where Lewes goals came mainly from dead ball situations. West Ham Ladies are capable of playing attractive football, but they need to be imposing it on opponents further up the pitch.

And so to this Sunday’s home fixture against Swindon Ladies. Swindon ladies have been poor this season, they have zero points and are shipping goals like nobody’s business. I expect West Ham Ladies’ strikers to shine, throw caution to the wind and to win well. If they don’t…. I expect to hear more Kiplingesque (Rudyard not the cake bloke) motivational battlecries or ‘we woz robbed’ excuses churned out by the media propaganda machine.

COYLI

Post Script: I was surprised that the players had to make their own travel arrangements to Lewes and that they didn't have a club photographer in tow........ just an observation.

Disclaimer: These views are my own and not of the club. (No shit! I hear you cry)