GianFranco has indicated that Freddie Sears is likely to go out on loan next season. After an initially promising impact, Sears has really failed to impress in the bit part appearances he has made during the second half of the season.
He is a relatively slender framed 19 year old and has looked extremely fragile and one dimensional against even mediocre Premiership defenders (I recall him getting nothing at all out of the donkey-like Huth at Middlesborough in the cup replay, for example).
GFZ’s job is to sound encouraging and offer Sears his best hope of development but I wonder if he really is trying to convince himself when he says “we believe he is an important player for us in the future”.
I’d like to take that on face value but somehow I doubt it’s authenticity.

youthful talent with long term potential?

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Love it or leave it, this is West Ham, we could easily support a team that will always finish in the top four but no, we support and love  a club that will always finish mid-table or in some cases relegated.

Zola will be happy with 9th place  under the circumstances in which he has had to manage the club, Steve Clarke as an assistant manager is and hopefully will be Zola’s right-hand man for a while to come.

My only sorrow this season is knowing that Tottenham will finish above us, but hats off to the club for climbing from 18th to 8th place in a matter of 7 to 8 weeks, which proves Harry Redknapp next season will probably take Tottenham amongst the top six and hopefully Zola and Steve Clarke will do the same for us.

Well done Fulham and Zamora in having such a great season.

Next Sunday will see West Ham at home to Middlesbrough, Middlesbrough are facing a relegation battle and will need to beat West Ham at least by five clear goals. I would hate to see Middlesbrough go down but that is inevitable.

It has been a season full of ups and downs for West Ham but then it would not be West Ham if this was never to happen, roll on season 2009/2010 to see what spoils that will bring, or will it be another headache with injured players or the FA trying to stuff us up the Khyber Pass again.

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Martin O’Neil has come out and criticised the revamped Uefa cup for being far too convoluted and I for one agree with him.
How many of those fans actually advocating the virtues of qualifying for it have actually looked at the fixture congestion that is going to result? With our current squad and our record in terms of injuries I can see this becoming a really burdensome commitment. I can see no way that we are ready to sustain another successful league campaign and compete on this footing.The games schedule is as follows:
Third qualifying round, 1st leg 28/29.07.2009
Third qualifying round, 2nd leg 04/05.08.2009
Play-off round, 1st leg 18/19.08.2009
Play-off round, 2nd leg 25/26.08.2009
Group stage, Matchday 1 15/16.09.2009
Group stage, Matchday 2 29/30.09.2009
Group stage, Matchday 3 20/21.10.2009
Group stage, Matchday 4 03/04.11.2009
Group stage, Matchday 5 24/25.11.2009
Group stage, Matchday 6 08/09.12.2009
First knockout round, first leg 16/17/23/24.02.2010
First knockout round, second leg 09/10/16/17.03.2010
Quarter-finals, first leg 30/31.03.2010
Quarter-finals, second leg 06/07.04.2010
Semi-finals, first leg 20/21.04.2010
Semi-finals, second leg 27/28.04.2010
Final (Santiago Bernabéu, Madrid) 22.05.2010

Even if we do hold our end up over this additional 18 games, it is going to mean an absolute glut of Sunday fixtures in 09/10. Give me 3pm on a Saturday anytime! And, yes, I do realise that success inevitably leads to odd fixture KO times and dates. I just don’t see us ready for this one. Not yet.

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Notwithstanding the fact that I’m not convinced that qualifying for the newfangled Europa league is necessarily a good thing for a club at our stage of development and with a small squad, I don’t believe that with the two clowns playing for us up front at the moment, we have much fo a chance of achieving the 4 points that will surely be the minimum requirement from the last two games.
Worse, it looks like we just might finish below the Spurs.
That said, I’m still happy with our overall direction and will look forward to next season with optimism.

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Watch Live

English Premier League - West Ham United vs Liverpool

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where you will find a link to the stream/s

Always try to get to the link about 5 minutes before the viewing schedule
Streams need to buffer and depending on the bandwidth of your Modem
the buffering may mean you will miss the start of your program.

Links Below

Link #1

Link #2

You will find the schedule for today on http://goalfanzine.com
scroll down the page as there are many links to various streams

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Regardless of where you stand in relation to the Europa league and whether or not it is actually desirable to qualify for it, presumably you would accept that if we are to finish in 7th spot we will need to gain a total of 2 points from the encounters against the mickey mousers (’pool and the Toffeemen) plus 3 against the Boro.
With Liverpool having nothing else to play for except pressing United as hard as they can, not to mention their 5 game run of 3 goals a game, only the most die-hard fanatic can be optimistic from a Hammers point of view. Do you fancy it?

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Setting aside the vitriolic tripe contributed by a couple of Chelsea supporters in response to my post on Friday in which I reminded you all about the disregard Lampard has exuded towards his creators, not to mention all England supporters, I have no support whatever for the abusive and personal chants directed towards Lampard and Terry on Saturday.
They served only to undermine the name of our club and motivate two exceptional players who, let’s be honest, need no motivation whatever in order to raise their games further against us.
I for one felt entirely uncomfortable to be surrounded by people singing that stuff and I am quite sure that thousands of others in the ground felt the same way.

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Watch Live Football

West Ham United v Chelsea Live on #GoalFanzine

CLICK ON 1 OF THE LINKS BELOW

Link will work start about 5 minutes before the game starts

A full list of links to todays Games/Matches/Races are on http://goalfanzine.com

just click and watch from that page

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Whilst I don’t condone the treatment BFF received at the hands of LBCs James O’Brien I cannot go with the outpourings of sympathy for this dude, least of all on the eve of his latest return to the hallowed turf that is Upton Park.
However much he tries to undo his previous utterances, I cannot forgive a man who came out in articles stating things like ‘I never really became a proper footballer until I arrived at Chelsea’ How disrespecful to the legend that is Tony Carr is that? How spiteful to the fans who supported the emerging talent like they had done his Father before him?
He really capped it off for me after the ignominious exit from the last world cup by our national side. In the furore that followed, Lampard actually had the gaul to state that ‘people should respect’ the national players for what they had done.
This is one sanctimonious egotist folks. Looking forward to the game…….

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Great to see Drogba and Lamps failing to beat Everton the other night. I think this could well work in our favour on Saturday in a game that they absolutely have to win if they are to have any chance of taking the title from the clutches of Man Utd.
I expect them to come out of the blocks real fast. I believe that if we can respond accordingly, keeping it tight for the first 30 minutes or so, we could just cause them a surprise and put the final nail in the Chelski coffin in terms of their title aspirations.

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