By Louis Nixon

Max Kilman has been subjected to monumental amounts of criticism across the back end of last season and throughout the entirety of this season, which ultimately led to the Englishman being dropped against Liverpool.

At 13:50, when the lineup came out, many were shocked to see Max Kilman dropped to the bench for Mavropanos who had supposedly faced a last-minute fitness test before starting. Some may say that changing a defence after being unbeaten in three is a ludicrous decision, and whilst in most cases many would agree, Kilman in this instance, is an outlier seeing as he’s mounted up costly errors across all three of those games, but they’d been swept under the carpet due to the results… something that fans might miss but the coaches and Nuno won’t. 

Against Newcastle, he was in the attacking third when Newcastle hit us on the counter, which led to him needing to sprint back, ultimately compromising Diouf as he had to cover for the Englishman. Against Burnley, he’d lost his man in the box which led to Burnley having a free header in goal which gave them their first goal, and finally against Bournemouth, his costly handball sparked the Cherries’ comeback. 

To make a mistake as a defender is normal, and even the world-class defenders in the Champions League or the Premier League aren’t immune to making mistakes, but to persistently make them every game week with no sign of improvement is a serious cause for concern, which is the likely reason as to why Kilman would’ve been dropped. 

Many thought that upon Nuno’s arrival, he’d be able to kick Kilman up a notch and get his performances to something near the £40 million we paid for him, but unfortunately, as with the other two managers he’s played under, he is struggling massively and if we are to receive an offer of anything near what we paid we should definitely accept it and close this dismal chapter. 

I don’t believe he’ll be leaving West Ham anytime soon due to the length of his contract as well as just the pure lack of interest, but seeing as Nuno appears to now prefer Mavropanos and Todibo, we could likely anticipate this being the duo in the future, and Kilman appearing more and more on the bench.