David Moyes faces sack decision at West Ham United with Andoni Iraola tipped to lose Bournemouth job first
Andoni Iraola is the most likely Premier League manager to lose their job first but David Moyes is “on that ride with him” at West Ham, according to Graeme Bailey.
The 90min journalist said on the Talking Transfers podcast on 26 October that the winless Bournemouth boss is in most danger currently, but the Irons manager also looks set to leave the London Stadium sooner or later.
A loss to Everton on Sunday (29 October) could put him under pressure of an imminent exit, but with no contract extension yet “under consideration” despite a European trophy win in May Bailey believes that is a “really telling” sign for the long-term future of the Scot at West Ham.
Bailey said of Iraola (28m 55s): “He’s firm favourite to go first, but there’s others on that ride with him. David Moyes is one of them who, good start to the season but West Ham were woeful last week, absolutely woeful…
“There’s no sign of an extension just yet, it’s not under consideration. They spent an awful lot of money in the summer, and they had the Declan Rice money – fair enough, they spent it pretty wisely. James Ward-Prowse is playing well and [Edson] Alvarez is doing well in midfield.
“Mo Kudus is not really getting the game time he deserves, but what a huge game for them this weekend against Everton. West Ham, they’re not going to get dragged into trouble because this is a really bad-quality Premier League this year…
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“I terms of managerial stuff I think Bournemouth with react first but if Everton beat West Ham this weekend where are West Ham going?
“It’s an interesting one to keep an eye on, David Moyes, the contract situation, the fans aren’t happy particularly. Although he won the Conference League I think a small majority wanted him to stay – 60/40, it wasn’t overwhelming.
“They saw what was coming because the football is just not good, and this is frustrating for West Ham because if you’ve got a team that has [Lucas] Paqueta, [Jarrod] Bowen, Kudus, Alvarez, Ward-Prowse, you shouldn’t be getting beaten 4-1 off Aston Villa…
“I think it’s really telling, you win a European trophy and you don’t get a new contract offer. I think that tells us everything we need to know about Moyes and his West Ham future, personally.”
Delaying the inevitable
Moyes is arguably a victim of his own success with the Hammers because he has elevated the fortunes at the London Stadium to a point where the club arguably needs to move on from him if they want to go any further.
It is undoubtedly a risk to do that but considering how poorly the Premier League season was last term, and how close he came to losing his job, it was unlikely to be entirely papered over by the trophy win.
That success can never be taken away from him, and the current era at West Ham will no doubt be looked upon fondly in years to come.
But if there were understandable doubts during the previous campaign’s struggles they were always likely to resurface if there was more difficulty this year.
A strong start to the campaign, following a surprisingly good end to the transfer window, helped strengthen Moyes’ position again.
But with results looking far more patchy of late, and with the usual frustrations over team selection, it won’t be long before questions start being asked.
Having got this close to the end of his contract it seems highly unlikely that he gets offered a new deal barring a storming season on all fronts, but unless he can recapture the early-season form it might be a question that gets answered some months before that.
In other West Ham news, a Hammers ace has named the Liverpool star he is hoping to emulate.
