Monday, February 13

Under pressure Bilic blows his top

Looking at the way Slaven Bilic reacted to West Brom's equaliser, it's surely a sign of the pressure he's been under in recent weeks with the Payet affair, poor summer signings, the stadium problems, sweating on Andy Carroll's fitness and some home hammerings from Man City and Arsenal. 

Even though West Ham have climbed to the bottom of the top half, all that frustration seemed to come out against West Brom. Slaven was already raging at the cosmos like Captain Ahab when he left his technical area to run half-way down the pitch to remonstrate with the lino as West Brom gained a throw-in in the 95th minute. When Albion scored he shouldn't have thrown down that furry boom microphone, though as far as trashing inanimate objects goes it certainly beats Jose Mourinho kicking a water bottle. 

Slaven's red card was justified and he now faces an FA charge for Improper Conduct. In reality, though Michael Oliver made some contentious calls, there was nothing as bad as Mike Dean's dismissal of Feghouli against Man United. Looking at the replays, that final throw-in did appear to be West Brom's after Antonio got a nick on the ball. Yes, there was a case for a free-kick being awarded for a foul on Feghouli before West Brom scored their first, but that doesn't excuse the defending of  Kouyate and Randolph as they allowed Chadli to score. Feghouli's disallowed goal appeared to be a correct decision as Antonio was offside and pushed the keeper. While even if the final throw-in had been incorrectly called as Bilic believed, West Ham still couldn't avoid conceding a corner and being outjumped in the box. Really it was his side's bad defending that incensed Super Slav.

Perhaps the moral is Bilic shouldn't see Green Day before a Premier League fixture. It was certainly ironic to see Tony Pulis trying to calm Bilic down. Hopefully Slaven will be able to unwind a bit during the warm-weather training in Dubai with some of Julian Dicks' relaxation tapes (which are mainly Megadeth). Who'd be a Premier League manager, eh?

2 comments:

matt said...

Perhaps Slav needs an emergency trip to San Francisco, to chill out and get his head together. I should probably join him...

Pete May said...

In fairness West Ham could probably turn most people into raging maniacs on the touchline…