With their near perfect record, it's unsurprising that West Ham players dominate that team. 6/11 and only two other clubs getting players in. Neither is Declan Rice as best player of the competition, he's the heart and soul of that team, and his almost certain departure does worry me what it will mean for the team. But they should get a huge sum of money for him after a bidding war for his contract.
West Ham had a big open top bus parade, huge turnout.
So much for the "Mickey Mouse Cup." We saw it last year with Roma filling their huge stadium for matches and having their own massive open top bus celebration. This cup matters, and it's time it got put into much larger stadiums for the final in future.
SimonB wrote: ↑Thu Jun 08, 2023 11:18
Well done to West Ham. I think it was one of the rare occasions when bookmakers didn't exaggerate the chances for the English team.
Even a broken clock is right twice per day.
West Ham had a lot of help from referees during its entire campaign.
To me the main reason why West Ham won the Conference League wasn't even that. Villarreal would be the winner now if Unai Emery was still in charge. When he left and Quique Setién replaced him they self-destructed. With Unai Emery they were 100% victorious, and without him they couldn't win a single game!
Ah I see that by mentioning Villarreal you may have misinterpreted me above. What I meant was concerning the final in isolation rather than the odds pre-tournament I felt that West Ham had a good chance to win against Fiorentina. Yes, often the English clubs odds appear to be overstated at the beginning of a tournament due to the weight of betting in the English market clearly.
SimonB wrote: ↑Thu Jun 08, 2023 11:18
Well done to West Ham. I think it was one of the rare occasions when bookmakers didn't exaggerate the chances for the English team.
Even a broken clock is right twice per day.
West Ham had a lot of help from referees during its entire campaign.
To me the main reason why West Ham won the Conference League wasn't even that. Villarreal would be the winner now if Unai Emery was still in charge. When he left and Quique Setién replaced him they self-destructed. With Unai Emery they were 100% victorious, and without him they couldn't win a single game!
Ah I see that by mentioning Villarreal you may have misinterpreted me above. What I meant was concerning the final in isolation rather than the odds pre-tournament I felt that West Ham had a good chance to win against Fiorentina. Yes, often the English clubs odds appear to be overstated at the beginning of a tournament due to the weight of betting in the English market clearly.
Villarreal were the bookmakers' favourite right up until they got knocked out.
Lorric wrote: ↑Wed Jun 07, 2023 23:28
West Ham fans belting out the words to We Are The Champions. I'm not sure if I've actually seen that before. Normally the song just plays when teams win things, the fans don't sing along with it.
In my experience it varies. First thing played? No. Fans will want to sing something specific to their team. A few songs in? Sure. These things are normally handled better at a teams home ground where the announcer will be more in tune with the teams' fans, rhough you can never count out an egotistical announcer wanting to impose their playlist. Wembley tends to screw it up. The PA there is ear splitting and songs get put on haphazardly without any thought for organic crowd noise or celebrations. A recent Arhletic piece about the oros and cons of Wembley had loads of comments from fans of different clubs making that point.
