“19th Century football” is how Jose Mourinho described Sam Allardyce and his West Hams tatics, as Chelsea were held to a goalless draw at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday evening. In a game where points where very important for both sides with Chelsea looking to remain in the hunt for top spot and the Hammers needing every point they can to avoid relegation this term. West Ham came with a plan, their intent to frustrate the Blues attack, to try to play deep and hold off Chelsea’s star studded free playing strike force of Hazard, Willan, Eto and co, and possibly try and sneak a sight of goal on a counter attack.  The statistics speak for themselves on this one with Chelsea dominating the evening and in total had 39 shots although only 9 actually on of them target and over half of them from outside the 18-yard line, in comparison to just the one loan effort from a West Hams James Tomkin’s header which didnt trouble Chelseas Petr Chech. What West Ham did, they did well, they absorbed the pressure and held strong. This was a big point to them and their manager was full of praise of his team and compared this result to the victory over Spurs earlier in the season, under current circumstances seeing West Ham leaking 17 goals in their last 5 games. 

On a night where emotions were running high Jose was starting to let his frustration show, complaining to the fourth official when he annouced there was to be only 4 minutes off time to be added wanting more. Jose made his feelings known after match saying “The referees are not uniform with it, sometimes there is seven minutes, sometimes there is only two minutes, they’re not consistant “. Mourinho couldnt resist taking a swipe at West Hams approach to the game,” This is not best league in the game football, this is 19th century football, pretending injuries, goalkeepers waisting time, not in the last minute but in the first minute, ten defenders in the box, very basic football”

” Its very difficult to play a football match where only one team want to play, i told Big Sam “, Jose continued, “they need points, because they need points, to come here and not play, and to do it the way they did…is it acceptable, maybe yes. But at the same time this is not premier league, the only thing i could use would be a black and decker to break down their wall”.

Sam Allardyce feeling very pleased and proud with himself and his team and expressed his joy that he gets seeing the Chelsea boss getting frustrated, jumping around in the techincal area and as he describes “Chelsea players trying to intimidate the referee moaning, He cant take it can he? he cant take it cos we’ve ‘out-taticed’ him, we outwitted him, he just cant cope.. He told me that but he can tell me all he wants, i dont give a s*** to be honest, its brilliant to get a result against him, Hard luck Jose!”.

Mourinho did add that he hopes West Ham avoid relegation “with the two points they took from us, i hope the one minute they get actually means something for them.”

Written by W.Cutmore