West Ham United 1-1 Nottingham Forest

 

 Played at the Boleyn Ground on Wednesday 22^nd October 2003

 

 Alan Pardew took charge of the West Ham United team for the first time on Wednesday as we looked to beat one of my favourites for this year’s title, Nottingham Forest, and get our home form on the up again after a disappointing two points out of six during the week. 

 

Pardew, and his first signing Hayden Mullins, could not have got off to a worse start as in the fifth minute, Mullins slipped, gifting Andy Reid a chance that he finished superbly to put his side 1-0 up.

ADMIN****I would like to express this is phil’s view and not mine, I believe if Rob Lee would’ve made a tackle then the goal wouldn’t have came.****

 

That was to be Forest’s only chance of the half as both sides struggled to hold on to the ball for any length of time. The referee should have awarded the Iron’s a penalty when a Jermain Defoe corner came in towards Don Hutchison but the referee and his assistant failed to see a blatant handball. This was to be the first of four huge penalty shouts from fans, but this was the only one that should have been given.

 

The half-time whistle arrived and West Ham were beginning to look dangerously poor. But Pardew must have had words with his players at half time as West Ham looked like a Premiership side for the next twenty minutes.

 

During that period, Jermain Defoe managed to score a well-taken goal that sent the 29,000 crowd into song after they were disappointingly quiet during the first half. But once again, we failed to take advantage of our pressure and Forest came back into the game, looking like they could snatch a victory.

 

Luckily, they didn’t and the 1-1 scoreline was a fair one. That now means that West Have taken three points from the last three home games, and we are looking worryingly close to dropping out of contention. Four points is the difference between us and top-of-the-table Wigan Athletic.

 

I did say that Pardew was perhaps not as great as everybody thinks, but it is far too early to start criticising. What I will say is that Tomas Repka has been our best player so far this season but Pardew moved him into central defence from right back and he looked very shaky and could give away goals in that position.

 

By Phil Crook (p.crook@lycos.com)