West Ham captain Mark Noble: Pressure to win and play the ‘right way’ is tough on youngsters coming through

Worldy: Callum Wilson opens the scoring for Bournemouth
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Mark Noble25 January 2019

I’m not allowed to bet on results in the Premier League but, even if I could, I don’t think I would do so because they’re just so difficult to call these days.

The defeat at Bournemouth once again demonstrated our inconsistency this season but we’re not alone in that respect. We did have that run of four successive wins against teams around us in the table but since then we’ve been a bit up and down.

Apart from the top four or five, that’s how it is. Look at Leicester. Their manager, Claude Puel, seems like he is under pressure despite the fact they’re ninth in the League. They’ve beaten Manchester City and Chelsea, yet lost to Cardiff and Southampton.

We’ve beaten Manchester United and Arsenal, plus taken a point off Chelsea, yet we’ve been beaten twice by Bournemouth and taken just one point from two games against Brighton.

That’s the reality and I keep on saying it — we will lose games because we’re not yet the finished article.

More than ever, it’s moments that change games. Last weekend, we had Andy Carroll’s miss and then a few minutes later they scored a worldy. That changed things massively.

In Pictures | Bournemouth vs West Ham | 19/01/2019

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We opened up in a search for an equaliser and got punished with another goal late in the game.

Sometimes it goes for you, other times it doesn’t. In those four games we won, we scored from almost every opportunity we had. Every time we went forward we seemed to find the net.

At Fulham, I remember they missed a couple of really good chances and we went down the other end — bang, bang — and scored two goals.

I think the pressure will be even greater in the future — and I feel for young players coming through.

It’s not just results any more — it’s how you get them, how you play.

I spotted a statistic recently that Sam Allardyce, whilst in charge of Everton, picked up more points than any of the four other recent managers there but that didn’t save him.

Now, under Marco Silva, they perhaps have more style but they’re not getting the results — and he finds himself under pressure.

Everton have more style but they’re not getting the results
AFP/Getty Images

The way football is perceived now is that you have to play out from the goalkeeper but often when we have done that, the crowd start to get restless, they want you to go forward, not play it around at the back. They want some action.

A similar thing is happening at Chelsea with what they’ve called ‘Sarri-ball.’ Jorghino was a superstar earlier in the season and had made the most passes in the Premier League but right now he is being hammered.

If I’m honest, I get really bored with listening and reading about it.

I still remember with perfect clarity something that happened down at Southampton a couple of seasons ago.

Puel was the manager then, they had just beaten Liverpool in the League Cup semi-finals, they were eighth in the League but we managed to beat them 3-1 and they were booed off.

I can still recall walking off the pitch and thinking, ‘How is this happening? How are they being booed off — and at Southampton of all places?’

I still have trouble getting my head around that. You’re eighth in the table, you’ve reached Wembley and you’re booing your team off. What else do you want?

It’s vital that we concentrate on Cup before Wolves clash

We have a big week coming up, with our FA Cup fourth-round tie against AFC Wimbledon tomorrow followed by another away match at Wolves on Tuesday.

Logistically, that means having tonight in a hotel, even though the match doesn’t kick off until 7.45pm, getting back late, training on Sunday and then travelling up to Wolverhampton on Monday.

It’s not ideal but that’s the way it is and it’s a good opportunity for us to keep going in the Cup.

Because we have that game at Wolves, I would imagine the manager will have to make changes for the Cup game.

Wolves have a certain way of playing. They scored a really late winner against us at home early in the season when they were on a good run. They suffered a dip but they and us are in that congested middle section of the table where six clubs are separated by just three points.

The first thing we have to do is win tomorrow and then look ahead to that game.

One player I would expect to be involved against AFC match is Grady Diangana, who has just signed a long-term contract.

It’s so important to keep your most promising homegrown players.

Grady came to ask me a few times about his contract situation — how I saw it and what he should do — and to sign a six-year deal at the age of just 20 is fantastic.

The one thing I did say was, “Look, Grady. You were nowhere near our first team a few months ago. You came over and trained with us once, you did really well, the manager took a shine to you — and look at what has happened since.

“Don’t forget where you were back then and now work even harder to get that next, even bigger contract. Don’t rest on this deal, go again and make sure you sign an even bigger one sometime in the future”.

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