West Ham will arrive at the Gtech Community Stadium on Saturday knowing these are pivotal days in determining how their season unfolds.
Four points from their opening five league games and hurled rather than knocked out of the Carabao Cup, 5-1 by Liverpool on Wednesday, the tenure of Julen Lopetegui has started miserably and left plenty of supporters pessimistic about their club’s long-term direction.
Lopetegui only took charge as head coach in the summer and is not understood to be under immediate threat of losing his job this early on in the season. That said, results must improve.
While the four defeats on his watch have come against four of the top five in the Premier League — three in the league, one in the Carabao Cup — the Hammers are now out of the woods in that regard.
So crucial, then, are their next two matches, against Brentford on Saturday and at home to newly-promoted Ipswich Town next weekend, in Lopetegui’s bid to restore faith with the club’s hierarchy.
Technical director Tim Steidten’s favoured candidate to replace David Moyes was Ruben Amorim, but his £16.7million release clause was deemed too pricey, and owner David Sullivan instead moved for Lopetegui.
It would be an ugly look for West Ham if they had to dispense with the Spaniard so early on, especially given how long they had to plan for life after Moyes. It had been clear for months that the Scot would walk upon the expiry of his contract in June.
Sullivan is not the trigger-happy type — Moyes was kept on while under pressure countless times during his time at the helm — and will only make a change if things turn sour. They threaten to unless results improve.
Animosity among supporters last season was particularly intense when West Ham were losing at home. That is why the visit of Ipswich to the London Stadium next Saturday is such a crucial game. Lose it, and Lopetegui could be scrabbling to stay afloat.
Fixtures against Brentford and Ipswich present golden opportunities to quell the noise of Lopetegui’s uneasy start to life with the Hammers ahead of the October international break. The Hammers cannot afford to be under pressure for immediate results when they return to action in mid-October. They face Tottenham and Manchester United then.
Lopetegui has spoken repeatedly about trying to keep “the good bits” of each performance, but the football has been defensively-minded and similar in style to Moyes’s approach.
There has been an unfortunate frontloading of difficult fixtures in the early weeks, granted, but West Ham are creating chances and scoring goals at a lower rate than under Moyes last season, when the atmosphere was similarly far from rosy. Lopetegui’s decision that set-piece specialist James Ward-Prowse was not in his plans appears a controversial one.
Lopetegui, as Steidten and Sullivan won’t have forgotten, is presiding over a team who finished the summer as Europe’s sixth-highest net spenders after rejuvenating an aging squad, and yet Guido Rodriguez has endured an underwhelming start, with Manchester United summer target Jean-Clair Todibo yet to play regularly. The sooner Niclas Fullkrug is back, the better.
West Ham could change the record with six points from the next two games, and this is where key men like Jarrod Bowen and Mohammed Kudus will be expected to step up.
Lopetegui has had a tough old time of it so far. Resolute in his belief that performances have not been anywhere near as disappointing as results, the 58-year-old will be confident the points will come. They must — and soon.
