David Moyes has been urged to walk away from West Ham at the end of the season by Ian Ladyman.

There is only one word that can be used to sum up what the atmosphere at West Ham is like following their 6-0 thrashing to Arsenal: toxic. Things have been that way for a while now, but the heavy defeat to their London rivals seems to have pushed fans on either side of the Moyes debate to their highest point of tension. 

In order to solve this, there must be some clarification provided on what the managerial situation is. Usually, you’d expect that to come from the board but Ian Ladyman believes that David Moyes should decide, off his own back, to leave the Hammers at the end of the season.

“Managers usually hang around to get sacked or they move on to something or somewhere better,” he explained on the It’s All Kicking Off podcast. “I think there’s a time in football where you’re absolutely within your rights to have a look at your body of work, look what you’ve done over a period of three or four seasons and say ‘you know what, I’m done here – I’ve done what I can do here’. Moyes has listed the achievements himself. I don’t need to repeat them.”

Co-host Chris Sutton agreed that he has probably achieved everything he would have possible have hoped to at West Ham, saying that “He’s overachieved at West Ham, so I get what you’re saying. It’ll be interesting what happens whether this new contract, which has been so much talked about in recent times, whether he ends up signing it. But in many respects he’s probably done all he can at West Ham hasn’t he?”

Old school managers like Moyes are becoming a dying breed in the modern game. The slow, counter-attacking football is becoming less and less common, especially in the Premier League. While the “pragmatic” style of play that the Scotsman puts out has been effective over the past few years at West Ham, this run of poor form has given the higher ups something to think about.

Whatever happens, the best thing that the club could do is be completely open with their supporters about what the current situation is regarding Moyes. It would mean that all fans can accept what is happening and, therefore, stop the pointless one-upping that those who are Moyes-in or Moyes-out are constantly looking to do to each other.