Leeds v West Ham Review Sept21

As sucker punches go, you can’t say that the one Michail Antonio landed on Saturday didn’t hurt.

I thought we perhaps saw the best and worst of where are right now, encapsulated in the space of 90 plus minutes against West Ham.

The first half performance was arguably as good as we’ve seen so far this season, but at 1-0 we had a huge chance to score again and take control of the game. We didn’t take it. Sounds familiar?

In the second half, when West Ham’s equaliser had a certain air of inevitability about it and as a consequence so did their late, late winner.

We all talk about confidence, and there’s nothing like a late goal to dent that even more than it already is. At 1-0 we were well placed in the game, but that lack of belief at the moment was evident and crept in more and more until they eventually nicked the points. I know what it’s like when you can’t buy a win, you do go deeper, it’s natural instinct. We saw that at Burnley the other week when we profited from them doing exactly that.

In a way we were undone in the same manner that we accounted for other teams last season. West Ham kept going, kept pushing, and got their reward. The difference between this season and last is that last season you always felt we had goals in us….this season, I’m not so sure.

I said in the summer that my worry was where the goals would come from when Patrick Bamford wasn’t on the pitch, and sadly that’s proving to be the case. Raphinha has scored a couple and offers real quality, but beyond that we are struggling for the spark, and not creating the chances that we have done before.

Of the plusses from Saturday, it was good to see Charlie Cresswell given an opportunity and Illan Meslier just looks better and better. He has proved to be an outstanding signing, and his saves kept us in the game for long periods on Saturday.

Beyond that, it really is back to the drawing board and all we can hope is that the late blow West Ham landed doesn’t linger because we have to be ready to go again for what is now massive game against Watford this weekend.