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Nuno Espirito Santo now has an FA Cup dilemma to contend with, following Crysencio Summerville’s heroics in a narrow, unconvincing West Ham United victory away at Burton Albion.
No matter the standard of opposition they will play next time out – the FA Cup fifth round draw is coming on Monday – be it Mansfield Town or Manchester City, can Nuno really trust his fringe players to get the job done?
They very nearly didn’t, get the job done that is, against a team sitting fourth from bottom in England’s third tier.
Harsh but true?
How concerned are you about West Ham’s squad depth?
Soungoutou Magassa and Mohamadou Kante underwhelmed in midfield, Kyle Walker-Peters and Ollie Scarles offered little in attack, and the less said about Adama Traore’s first start in a West Ham United shirt, the better.
Thanks to his extra-time sending off, Freddie Potts will begin a three-game suspension on the day Jean-Clair Todibo makes his return at Bournemouth.
Not that they were ever likely to anyway, but it is safe to say Jarrod Bowen, Mateus Fernandes, Aaron Wan-Bissaka and matchwinner Crysencio Summerville will not be fearing for their place any time soon.
Adama Traore struggles and Freddie Potts sent off as West Ham United beat Burton Albion
Now, to offer you a little peek behind the curtains into the machinations at Hammers News, we usually run a weekly Man of the Match poll where our readers can vote for their standout performer. We didn’t really feel there was much point today.
Nuno needed an ‘unstoppable’ Summerville, to save his blushes, Joe Cole singled out Ezra Mayers, and debutant Keiber Lamadrid demonstrated some nice little glimpses of his talent.
Photo by Darren Staples / AFP via Getty Images
We thought it made more sense, though, to ask which players you felt let an opportunity slip through their fingers. If it wasn’t obvious already, there’s a sizeable gulf between West Ham’s first-team and those on the fringes.
“Although a massive upturn by the first 11 recently, unfortunately our cup run so far shows how good the overall squad actually is,” one fan wrote on our Facebook page. “[But] You can’t win it if you’re not in it, and you only need a 1-0 in a cup match.”
“Scraped through, but that’s West Ham!” another said. “Summerville rescued us.”
“Hard watch, but we are in the hat for round five.”
“My view is that we had youngsters that gained experience but, if we had put an experienced player alongside them, would have been ideal.”
“What concerns me is the depth of our squad. If we’re relegated and the first-team players exact their release clauses, then many of these lads would really struggle in the Championship.”
“What stood out for me was our second string are not good enough to survive in the Premier League. They would struggle in the Championship. Maybe lack of experience playing together but nowhere near good enough. Looked like we were playing Burton Madrid!”
Hammers survive a scare in Staffordshire! 🏆 🫣
Which player were you most disappointed by? Vote here and tell us in the comments
Traore voted the Hammers’ most disappointing in FA Cup win
At the time of writing, 30 per cent of you voted Traore as West Ham’s most disappointing player on a needlessly tense afternoon at the Pirelli Stadium.
Potts picked up 23 per cent of the vote after that silly lunge which left his teammates playing the second half of extra-time with a man light.
And for all the hype surrounding young Mohamadou Kante – the West Ham kid has been likened to Patrick Vieira on more than one occasion while racking up a handful of stand-out displays against senior opposition in the EFL Trophy – this was more a day for ‘minutes in the legs’ than anything else.
“The most important thing is that [the youngsters] had the chance to play, get minutes in the legs, and get rhythm,” Nuno said at full-time.
“This is important because, moving forward, we are going to need them all.”
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