Congratulations in advance the good folks of Vital Chelsea as another win, our fourth in the Premier League so far this season is potentially on the way this weekend, as we travel to the Boleyn Ground in East London as West Ham play hosts. Yours truly couldn’t be happier that we are the visiting team as the Hammers have been hammering teams on the road all season with reckless abandon. This weekend they play at home, where they’ve won just one, lost two, and drawn the other in four games!
The Slaven Bilic-tutored side have developed this worrying, albeit impressive knack of picking up wins everywhere but one – ironically, to Sunderland where they drew 2-2 – they have travelled to this season, not excluding wins at the Etihad Stadium, Anfield and The Emirates Stadium; although it must be clarified that that’s not the same as me insinuating from the corner of my mouth, er, my keyboard, that there’s anything special about that scum stadium in North London anyway.
Back when the Hammers’ vintage was made up of Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters it was often said of the side that, like fine wine, they didn’t travel well. In fact, over the years, it’s usually been their home form that enabled them pick up the necessary points to stay afloat; away wins were, in those days, rare and precious things. Nowadays, under their Croatian manager’s direction though, the team don’t just travel with hope but also with great confidence, and even a little certainty.
What arrogance?!
Well, they’ve backed it up. They’re the side with the best away form having picked up as many as 13 points from a possible 15 on the road in the league so far this season, scoring 12 goals and conceding just 4 in the process; and considering our dismal home form at this stage of the season, which include two losses to Southampton and Crystal Palace, whom the Hammers beat 3-1 last weekend at Selhurst Park, it’s too probable that the East Londoners would have also travelled well at our expense. One doesn’t need to be a good bookmaker to think that.
Add those to the fact that they are a side with the best goal scoring record outside that of Manchester City, sitting pretty in fourth place on the log on 17 points – just four points adrift of leaders City – and you’ll appreciate why yours truly is glad the Hammers won’t be hitting the road this weekend.
But can we take advantage though?
Asked what the secret to their scintillating away form is, England international right-back Carl Jenkinson who joined West Ham on a season-long loan deal from Arsenal in the summer transfer window tried explaining:
“I don`t know what the secret to our away form is but we’re just playing with freedom and we’re playing good football at the moment,” the 23-year-old told West Ham’s official website.
“We’re playing with confidence and we`ve got players like Dimitri who are producing the goods week-in week-out. We’re playing really well at the minute and we`re all really enjoying it.”
Is there anything we can take from the above quote?
The keyword “freedom”, ahem, stood out for me.
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