It's mystifying why The Apprentice's Karren Brady and co thought alienating the loyal customer base was a sensible business move. It's also good that the already expensive season ticket prices have been frozen. One of my pals finds all this a bit suspicious and wonders if the club are softening us up for a takeover by Elon Musk and the London Stadium being relocated to Mars. But right now it seems the board has simply decided to do the right thing. A shame it took so long.
Brian Dear and Geoff Pike are on the pitch before kick-off sharing memories of Ronnie Boyce, along with some replays of his FA Cup winning goal in 1964. I'm joined by Matt, still trying to understand the rules of rugby and how to depart from Twickenham, Lisa, Nigel, Michael and Big Sam.
Matt is on fine form asking us which player on the pitch has a sibling who is an MP. It is of course Bobby de Cordova-Reid, whose sister Marsha de Cordova is MP for Battersea. Not a lot of people know that.
Up against a team that has lost ten out of 11 matches, what could possibly go wrong? The stadium is strangely subdued as if the crowd sense a possible banana skin. It's an unchanged side from Arsenal, with Scarles and Wan-Bissaka high up the pitch as wing-backs. Leicester have an early shot through Ndidi, but after that it's all West Ham probing, albeit rather slowly at times.
West Ham take the lead after Bowen and Soucek initiate an attack on the right, the ball is cleared, Creswwell crosses for Kudus to fire against Hermansen and Tomas Soucek taps home the rebound. No-one celebrates that much awaiting VAR to deem it offside, but in fact Vestergaard is playing Kudus onside. Tomas wheels away to celebrate his sixth goal of the season dreaming of extra potato salad on his 30th birthday.
Bowen shoots wide after good work from Wan-Bissaka and Ward-Prowse. The second duly arrives when Ward-Prowse's corner causes confusion in the box. Bowen gathers the ball on the byline and shoots across goal from a tight angle, the ball deflecting in off Vestergaard. Credit to Bowen for his improvisation, but it's another poor goal for hapless Leicester to concede.
We're anticipating a possible thrashing to boost our goal difference in the second half, but West Ham start to showboat a bit and seem to have settled for a two-goal win. The 38-year-old Jamie Vardy has lost his pace and Areola has very little to do. The Leicester fans celebrate a corner with ironic abandon.
The Greek Bloke, Emerson and Soler come on for Todibo, who has looked solid again, Scarles and Alvarez and the side's rhythm is further disrupted. Eventually Ferguson comes on too and he should score after Bowen sets him up with a great run from his own half. But the Brighton loanee takes three touches instead of two and allows a tackle to come in - the sign of a player lacking in confidence.
Still, it's a professional win against a side that looks certain to go down and it's hard to complain about six points and two clean sheets in five days even if it wasn't great fare for the TNT viewers. These are WHU's first back to back wins since last March. At the final whistle I'm prepared to predict that we'll stay up now we're 16 points clear of Ipswich.
We head to Ye Olde Black Bull for a swift pint of Brixton Pale for me and a Wherry for Matt that isn't Wherry good. The consensus is that the Premier League is in a poor state when you can predict the bottom three and champions in February. But a win is a win and it's now very much a case of finishing as high as WHU can and preparing for next season. Irons!
PLAYER RATINGS: Areola 6; Wan-Bissaka 6, Todibo 6 (Mavropanos 6), Kilman 6, Cresswell 6, Scarles 6 (Emerson 5); Soucek 7 (Irving n/a), Alvarez 6 (Soler 5), Ward-Prowse 6; Kudus 7 (Ferguson 5), Bowen 8.
Sid Lowe interviews Julen Lopetegui in Sunday's Observer and the former West Ham gaffer seems to be in denial about the reasons he was sacked. He argues: "We weren't in danger and we were adapting, learning, taking steps." Though not too many fans could see signs of progress, whereas Potter seems to have created a more organised side and better team spirit in a matter of weeks. Loppy's sacking came after a 5-0 home defeat to Liverpool and a 4-1 defeat at Man City. The only really impressive performance was the win at Newcastle, but even allowing for trying to change the the Hammers to a possession-based side, there were too many dispiriting defeats and poor performances.
The way Lopetegui was sacked was certainly very undignified however and you do feel sorry for him in that, as the piece implies, most of the signings were from Tim Steidten, "but few signings worked out, Lopetegui not convinced." When asked about the now departed Steidten Lopetegui says: "I prefer not talk about the Tim subject. That's the past, internal issues..." Click on the link to read the whole interview.
It's an undercover mission for this one, dodging down Drayton Park and then sitting among the Gooners on the halfway line. Potter reverts to a five-man defence, drops Mavropanos for Todibo and brings in Ollie Scarles at left back and Ward-Prowse in midfield. But without Paqueta West Ham's chances seem slim.
Early on there's a dangerous cross from Trossard and a shot from Calafiori straight at Areola. But with the game goalless after 15 minutes something strange is happening — West Ham are playing rather well. Wan-Bissaka plays a give and go with Alvarez and makes a fine dash down the right to cross for Bowen who scuffs a good chance wide. Soucek has a header just over the bar.
This is more like Potterball. Cresswell is marshalling the five man defence well, Todibo is looking like the solid defender we thought he should be, Ward-Prowse is playing simply and effectively in midfield and Kudus is holding the ball up well.
Arsenal's makeshift forward line of Trossard and Merino is struggling and young Scarles is doing really well against wonderkid Nwaneri. Meanwhile the West Ham fans are suggesting that Declan Rice should have looked for a larger employer on LinkedIn.
On 44 minutes the unthinkable happens. Cresswell wins a tackle in the box and releases Bowen who finds Wan-Bissaka racing from his own half. The full-back uses all his speed to get down the line, fool Calafiori with a couple of stepovers and cross for Jarrod Bowen to head home having got beyond Declan Rice. Blimey. I have to keep quiet among the disgruntled Gooners. A great time to score.
More strange things happen in the second half. After some premature "oles" from the Irons' fans, a great tackle from Ward-Prowse releases Cresswell whose cross is just missed by Bowen. The anticipated Arsenal siege begins with Trossard shooting against the legs of Areola. Rice is subbed and Mavropanos comes on for Todibo, who's had a good game.
IT'S QUIET IN THE LIBRARY
"Mikel Arteta it must be the ball!" sing the Hammers fans on 73 minutes as the impressive Kudus nicks the ball away from Lewis-Skelly on the halfway line. The young fullback brings him down and is booked. Only Raya is way off his line and Kudus would surely have got a shot away, VAR intervenes and Craig Pawson goes to the screen and opts for a red card as the Arsenal fans throw down their books in disgust. Match of the Day later proves this to be a correct decision.
Ten-man Arsenal still come at the Hammers as the home crowd gets nervy. But every Hammer is putting their body on the line to block and head danger away. A free kick from Odegaard is deflected to Gabriel who fires over.
There's a nerve-wracking eight minutes of added time as Kudus gets away again only for sub Ferguson to prove not quite sharp enough and turn into traffic. Ben White blazes wide and then incredibly it's all over. What a contrast to last week's loss to Brentford.
My WhatsApp tells me that Nigel is dancing in the streets of Bromley with the teacake-wielding Harrogate away crew and Matt is trying to understand rugby in the Calcutta Cup while dancing in the streets of Twickenham.
It's a happy trek to my north London safe house, where Gooner Peter is consoled with herb tea and biscuits. This was a really fine disciplined performance where every player did well. We've inflicted Arsenal's first home defeat of the season. Football, bloody hell. Irons!
PLAYER RATINGS: Areola 7: Wan-Bissaka 8, Todibo 7 (Mavropanos 7), Kilman 7, Cresswell 8, Scarles 8; Alvarez 7 (Soler n/a), Soucek 7, Ward-Prowse 8; Kudus 8, Bowen 9 (Ferguson 6).
There's a four-piece band outside the stadium playing Tequila but replacing the chorus with "Paqueta!", which is about as good as it gets. I'm joined by Nigel, fresh from the new Led Zeppelin movie, Michael and Big Sam, who has trekked from deepest Wales.
Before kick-off we have a minute's applause in memory of Ronnie "Ticker" Boyce and a decent atmosphere. That changes after three minutes as a simple ball over the top sees Mbuemo nick the ball past Emerson, Schade shoot, Areola make two good saves only for the Brentford man's third effort to cross the line. It's the tenth goal that West Ham have conceded in the first ten minutes this season.
A tardy Matt and Lisa are arriving at this point, having raced from watching a defeat for the WHU Under 21s. We discover that Matt, a true romantic, has for Valentine's Day taken Lisa to watch the Under-18s rather than Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy.
It's a dire first half from the Hammers, with the side looking way off the pace against a sharp Brentford. Areola has to make a decent stop from Mbuemo. A terrible crossfield pass from Paqueta sees Wissa net only to be ruled just offside. Soler is fouled as West Ham break but the ref allows play to continue as Schade hits the post to a chorus of boos. Mavropanos has to make a great saving tackle. After more intricate passing Brentford net again only to have it correctly ruled out for a narrow offside.
The best West Ham have offered is a couple of dangerous crosses from Jarrod Bowen and even worse, Nigel has forgotten his lucky banana, claiming that his choice of snack might not make a difference to our results.
Potter has to do something at half time and brings on Ferguson, Ward-Prowse and Scarles for Soler, Soucek and Emerson. Young Evan Ferguson looks a little like Leo Woodall, Bridget Jones' new love interest, though so far West Ham have sent most of us to the edge of reason.
The Irons play like a different team in the second half and get stuck in. Some neat ball juggling from Bowen releases Ferguson who shows a good burst of speed to get to the line and pull back for Kudus to fire over a gaping goal. That should have been 1-1 and Mo seems struggling for form and confidence.
James Ward-Prowse plays sensibly and looks like Lionel Messi compared to what's come before, as West Ham threaten the Brentford goal. Paqueta wins a free kick on the edge of the box which is deflected wide, with the ref not even giving a corner. Bowen has a penalty appeal refused and Ferguson uses his strength to hold off three defenders and fire a shot at Flekken. We've looked a lot better with a young mobile target man.
Ward-Prowse gets a round of applause every time he takes a corner, though without Soucek there's not too much to aim at. At times we make the Brentford defence seem as impregnable as that of FC Astra. The Bus Stop from Hounslow players see out the game fairly comfortably.
We head to the Eagle for London Pride from the fridge. Matt wants to know which one of our mates has seen a game in Uzbekistan (it's Lisa obviously) and we then end up discussing the work of Nick Hornby and Gill Hornby, and whether an artist's early works are their best. All better than talking about the match. To compound our gloom the TV is showing Everton winning at Crystal Palace under bright young manager David Moyes.
If we lose to Leicester we really will be in the relegation mix. With 13 games left some wins are needed urgently to save the season.
PLAYER RATINGS: Areola 6; Wan-Bissaka 5, Kilman 5, Mavropanos 5 (Guilherme n/a); Emerson 5 (Scarles 6); Alvarez 5, Soler 4 (Ferguson 7), Soucek 4 (Ward-Prowse 6), Paqueta 6; Kudus 5, Bowen 6.
At this rate Jarrod might end up as the landlord of the Queen Vic when he retires. Though some of the regulars need to brush up on their trivia knowledge as in the West Ham quiz they struggled to name Billy Bonds as the oldest player to appear for the Irons.
This has to rank up there in great WHU TV moments alongside the cast of Gavin and Stacey wearing vintage West Ham shirts for Smithy's stag night, Leo Woodall's Essex geezer Jack singing Bubbles in season two of White Lotus and Donna Noble saying she learned to whistle "up West Ham" in Doctor Who.
