Match Day West Ham v Burnley, Saturday 10th March 15:00

[SALTIRE]

Match chat.

 

[claret50]

This is a must win game after the rubbish displayed against Swansea last week,, with just 9 games left to play and 6 of those games at home we should pick up enough points to remain in this league - with a bit of luck.

 

[Pickleman1967]

Battle of the Clarets, a much needed win for Burnley last time out after a long winless run. West Ham have been up and down under Moyes, it is hard to know what to expect most of the time. Draw nailed on.

West Ham 1 Burnley 1

 

[Pickleman1967]

Spam fans trying to get the game abandoned after going 2 zip down against the mighty Burnley. Thuggish, stupid behaviour, if the game does get abandoned I hope the PL award the W to Burnley and deduct 3 points from West Ham.

 

[G.B]

https://twitter.com/SkyJohnnyP/status/972510889298612227

 

[Pickleman1967]

Said it once, I'll say it again, 3 points deduction should be on the cards here. Pathetic policing of the crowd, Noble is probably the only one from this shambolic club to come out of it with any credit for standing up to one of the d*ckheads who invaded the pitch. I do hope they go down so they can take their "passion" into the Championship.

 

[Nilsson]

 

[claret50]

As far as I'm aware, stewarding and policing (general crowd control) is the responsibility of the London stadium owners.

 

[Super_horns]

• Probably just get a fine if nothing else and they will just keeping "protesting"

Nothing happened till it was 0-1 then the West Ham clearly must have been affected so could say those thugs cost their own team any points.

 

[Cornish Piskie]

A long read but worth it.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...-hooligans-icf-action-group-a8244951.html?amp

Now, I know Charlton supporters have also been quite unruly recently over their situation so we don't really have a great deal of room to talk about disrupting matches. The only difference being that the Charlton fans did it in an organised way, at the start of games, and having made their point, stopped and let the game go on. Everybody was clearly all pulling in the same direction for the good of the club. That's a bit more understandable.

But read the article I've linked to above. West Ham's situation looks more tribal than anything else. Ultras and Inter City Firm and another group who can't even decide on their acronym engaged in some sort of turf war tied in with extreme right-wing politics. Oh, and they want out of the Olympic Stadium too. As the article says, there's an element of "Judean People's Front" about the whole thing.

Perhaps I'm reading this wrong because it does seem to be a confused situation. Perhaps Claret 50 can give us some sort of insight into the situation. Over to you, Claret.

 

[claret50]

No special insight to offer, Just a feeling of great sadness to what's happened to the club I've supported for nearly 70 years, the current owners saw an opportunity to grab what they thought was a bargain and that the supporters would welcome the OS with open arms - they got that completely wrong - the stadium move has been a disaster, considering that they already had council approval to extend the seating areas at the Boleyn (utilising the 4 corners of the ground) but that would have cost them money!

The reported involvement of the ICF in that article is hogwash, Those idiots are long gone, even Cass Pennant is 60 years old.
This article explains why the supporters feel disillusioned with the board
https://www.eurosport.co.uk/football/premier-league/2017-2018/_sto6672279/story.shtml

 

[Cornish Piskie]

I quite see the anger of West Ham fans who have always enjoyed watching matches from right on top of the pitch, to find themselves sitting on the far side of a running track, but I think the likelihood of getting your wish of knocking it down and rebuilding it as Upton Park Stratford is somewhat remote regardless of what Danny Boyle or James Bond would like to do.

Under the legacy arrangements for London 2012, UK Athletics secured a 50 year lease on the stadium from 2016 and will have priority use of the stadium.

The agreement between the E20 Stadium LLP (the Partnership set up between London Legacy Development Corporation and the London Borough of Newham to manage the Stadium) included the following:

There will also be a permanent community track with dedicated facilities adjacent to the main Stadium available for use by the local community and clubs as part of the ongoing commitment to a lasting athletics legacy in east London.

UK Athletics will hold its annual London Diamond League meetings, alongside a whole spectrum of national level and age group championships, providing opportunities for the stars of today and the future to follow in the footsteps of London 2012 heroes like Mo Farah, Jessica Ennis, Hannah Cockroft and Johnnie Peacock.

Now, the way I read that, UK Athletics have a legally binding lease on the stadium for 50 years and those responsible for the Olympics legacy has given them priority use.

Frankly, West Ham United's interests come second to those of UK Athletics. I can imagine how that sticks in the throats of football fans who would argue that the Diamond League Athletics meets take place only once every year, but there is more to legacy than that.:

In December 2010, the Government published a new Legacy plan, which set out the legacy vision for the 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games, and the detailed plans underpinning it. It identified four areas to focus on: harnessing the UK’s passion for sport to increase grassroots participation, particularly by young people, and to encourage the whole population to be more physically active; exploiting to the full the opportunities for economic growth offered by hosting the Games; promoting community engagement and achieving participation across all groups in society through the Games; and ensuring that the Olympic Park can be developed after the Games as one of the principal drivers of regeneration in East London

The six London boroughs hosting the Games – Barking and Dagenham, Greenwich, Hackney, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Waltham Forest – published plans for legacy in 2009. This was outlined in the Strategic Regeneration Framework which included the objective that by 2030, the communities hosting the Games would have the same social and economic life chances as at least the London average. This is the principle of Convergence and guides its joint working on legacy.

The Strategic Regeneration Framework and Convergence made real the promise in the original bid document that “By staging the Games in this part of the city, the most enduring legacy of the Olympics will be the regeneration of an entire community for the direct benefit of everyone who lives there”. The principle of Convergence is included in the Mayor of London’s spatial development strategy, known as The London Plan.

I've emboldened what I think is the key line in the last paragraph. Legacy is about regeneration of the whole community, not the narrow, self interest of one football team whose fans care nothing for anything or anybody else. You can argue how much money West Ham put into the Stadium, but they signed their contracts in full knowledge of the facts. Nobody hid anything from them. They went into this with their eyes open and if they thought they'd get their feet under the table and then ride roughshod over the agreement then it's not turning out that way and if that was their plan then I hope they don't.

If there was an error in moving to the Olympic Stadium, that error was West Ham's, not those who bid for the Games, built the stadium or gave a legally binding contract to UK Athletics for priority use of it after the Games.

It's West Ham's mess. Why should an entire community be deprived their lawful entitlement just so Hammers fans can sit closer to the pitch..?

And another argument might be: If what we saw last weekend was how West Ham fans behave, why should they get what they want..? Athletics fans don't behave like that. Why reward football hooligans thuggery..?

 

[Super_horns]

Could they have not built their own stadium somewhere?- I accept it's London so not easy!!

 

[Cornish Piskie]

Well, East London is an area of intense regeneration and I imagine there would be a plot of land somewhere in the old Docklands which could be utilised. I don't know if they tried to go down that road. Over to Claret again on that one. Perhaps they would have done better to upgrade Upton Park and increase that stadiums capacity.

But it's too late to do anything about that now. Somehow they have to get on with it and get the message over to their fans that they just have to suck it up and watch the match from a bit further away. I went to the Olympics in 2012 and had no difficulty in seeing all the action. The view was excellent. Why do football fans HAVE to be right on top of the pitch..?

 

[Skinner]

To abuse the opposition players, durr

 

[Jackinky]

We could have re-built Upton Park. The East Stand could have been re-developed (and I think there were plans to do this), so could have been up to 45,000. Seeing how Spurs' new stadium looks makes me jealous as that's how we wanted- and were told- that the Olympic Stadium would be.

 

[Super_horns]

. Why do football fans HAVE to be right on top of the pitch..?

I think the issue is they were so close and now are in their eyes "miles away"!

Guess some middle ground and communication between fans and owners might have been useful but that doesn't happen now very often.

The owners simply went for an option where they didn't have to pay very much and wanted to attract new younger fans which clearly might well back fire on them!

Really it's just part of a few reasons why they hate the board ..

Like most football fans the Hammers expected big ambition and star signings.

Certainly not to be losing 3-0 at home to Burnley..

 

[G.B]

they're being run on the cheap, similar too ourselves. promises of quality players joining to get fans onside, they then sell payet and replace him with snodgrass. loads of loan signings etc. it's easy to see why the fans are pissed after all the false promises and the situation with the stadium. they've lost their identity. lad at work was telling me their (excuse for a) training ground is a dump and the upton park land was sold to a company with links to sullivan jr. dunno if there's truth to that but that'd be another reason for unrest.

the pair of them are cowboys and this is almost identical to what happened with them at birmingham before they sold the club off to a criminal, moving stadium (though they failed to do that with birmingham despite their best efforts) protests and all.