By Louis Nixon

Since the beginning of the season, not many people tipped West Ham to go down, but that chart is slowly being flipped over time. 

There are numerous reasons as to why West Ham are struggling. Some people have blamed it on the quality of the players, some have placed it on the managers, but for me, one of the most debilitating factors has been our mentality in certain games and the dropping of heads in the crucial moments that have really cost us. 

Whilst the whole season can be spoken upon, focusing on the last two games really gives you the necessary needs to paint the picture, for example, against Aston Villa, despite being in a winning position, when we conceded the third for them to make it 3-2, our heads just completely dropped for the last 10 minutes.

We went from chasing the ball to walking for it, the loss of adrenaline was evidently too much to handle and there was nothing that could be done, it felt as all hope was lost. 

Additionally, if you look at yesterday’s game against Manchester City, the problem wasn’t the fact that we were playing Manchester City; it was the mentality that we adopted and it ultimately cost us a chance at even putting up a fight.

Once 2-0 down, we looked straight away to go to ‘damage limitation mode’ and played as if we tried to protect our already doomed goal difference.

Despite us having a brief spell of chances, it was only a couple and realistically wouldn’t have been enough to convert in any match… 

But why is this so poor? Let’s look at another team we’re facing for the drop, Leeds. They went to Manchester City, went 2-0 down, and they managed to bring it back to 2-2!

They fought, refused to give up and with some relentless pressure, things went their way, and they made it much easier for themselves, but it’s the fact that they demonstrated their capabilities to the fullest despite them eventually losing in the last minute, meanwhile, the messily Hammers were left for dead. 

Mentality is a massive aspect of Football and without it, you’ll find yourself struggling despite whichever capabilities and talents you own as a player. Unfortunately, the squad is broken in that aspect and only time will tell if we can regain the broken pieces of glass to form as one once again.