{"id":243608,"date":"2025-11-04T16:33:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-04T16:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/243608\/"},"modified":"2025-11-04T16:33:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-04T16:33:09","slug":"alan-pardew-admits-freddie-potts-reminded-him-of-premier-league-icon-in-west-ham-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/243608\/","title":{"rendered":"Alan Pardew admits Freddie Potts reminded him of Premier League icon in West Ham win"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The only downside to watching Freddie Potts swagger around the pitch \u2013 as former West Ham United manager Alan Pardew did during Sunday\u2019s 3-1 victory over Newcastle \u2013 is that such a sight should not have taken this long to arrive.<\/p>\n

It had been a common question, or complaint, if you like, throughout the first nine matchdays.<\/p>\n

What more did Freddie Potts<\/a> need to do to start a Premier League match? Graham Potter felt the Hammers starlet wasn\u2019t ready<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Nuno Espirito Santo came in for criticism<\/a>, too, especially after picking Andy Irving and Tomas Soucek ahead of him, Mateus Fernandes and Soungoutou Magassa during the 2-1 defeat at Leeds.<\/p>\n

So a commanding, classy and mature Potts performance, as West Ham United<\/a> roared back to beat Newcastle at the London Stadium, was one in the eye for those who doubted the 22-year-old\u2019s top-flight credentials.<\/p>\n

And Alan Pardew, who coached both clubs during a lengthy managerial career, feels that it is no exaggeration to compare Potts to a young Mark Noble<\/a> on Sunday\u2019s evidence.<\/p>\n

\"FreddiePhoto by Neal Simpson\/Sportsphoto\/Allstar via Getty ImagesAlan Pardew likens Freddie Potts to West Ham United legend Mark Noble<\/p>\n

The frustrating thing is, how much better would West Ham have been \u2013 against the likes of Brentford, Leeds and Everton \u2013 had Nuno put his faith in Potts a month or so earlier in his tenure?<\/p>\n

Only El Hadji Malick Diouf made more tackles against Newcastle. Only Max Kilman and Aaron Wan-Bissaka completed more clearances. Only Lucas Paqueta made more passes. <\/p>\n

Twenty years after Pardew handed legendary captain Noble his first start in a claret and blue shirt, he could not help be reminded of the man who now has the luxury of watching his potential protege from a front row seat in his position as sporting director. <\/p>\n

\u201cForget about his disallowed goal, it was just his all-round performance,\u201d Pardew says, Potts denied a first senior West Ham goal due to a narrow offside against Tomas Soucek. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe looked like Mark Noble to me, I can\u2019t give him higher praise than that. His dad [Steve] must be so proud.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steve Potts was promoted to Nuno\u2019s first-team staff<\/a> last month, alongside fellow academy coaches Mark Robson, Gerard Prenderville and Billy Lepine. The former Wolves, Tottenham Hotspur and Nottingham Forest coach seems determined to make more use out of one of Britain\u2019s most prosperous youth systems.<\/p>\n

Freddie Potts\u2019 first start comes after Callum Marshall made his Premier League bow<\/a> under Nuno. Ollie Scarles started successive matches too before dislocating his shoulder at Elland Road.<\/p>\n

Potts is now the third member of his family to play top-flight football in claret and blue, by the way. Steve played over 500 games for the club while older brother Dan \u2013 now at Luton Town \u2013 also rose through the ranks in East London. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt carries so much weight with West Ham fans, when they\u2019ve got one of their own strutting about like he was [against Newcastle],\u201d adds Pardew, who took the Hammers to the FA Cup final in 2006. <\/p>\n

\u201cHis little touches on the ball, his movement, trying to find space, etc, etc. Brilliant. And that kind of pedigree is always nice. [Potts is following in the footsteps of] the Lampards, for example.\u201d<\/p>\n

West Ham academy graduate announces himself in the Premier League<\/p>\n

Potts was named Man of the Match on Sunday, serenaded by a chorus of \u2018One of our own\u2019 from the home fans. Only a first senior goal would have improved a magical afternoon.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just wanted to fight for my shirt,\u201d a delighted Potts said, speaking to the official West Ham website<\/a>. \u201cI think it\u2019s a saying, but you\u2019ve got to do\u00a0everything on the pitch to show the manager and show everyone that you want to be here\u00a0and you want to play in the Premier League.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just wanted to win every battle that\u00a0I could out there and do everything I could for the team, and I think we all did that\u00a0together as a team today.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it wasn\u2019t just me, but there were a lot of players, everyone\u00a0did it. We all fought for the shirt, and we came away with three points, which I think\u00a0was deserved.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like everyone today showed that we\u2019ve got\u00a0the character and the challenge to come back from positions that we have been in the past,\u00a0and we can win games, especially against teams like Newcastle who attack really\u00a0well,\u201d adds the former Portsmouth loanee.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can definitely attack back and win games, and we showed that today, that we\u2019ve got that fight and desire, and I feel like everyone showed that, and it was really good to see.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, after that goal when it was ruled offside,\u00a0I forgot about it until someone told me after the game! I was told by Ollie [Scarles] it was so close, and I\u00a0remembered about it. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut the main thing today was to come into the team and help everyone and\u00a0do what I can, and, thankfully, we showed a performance and fight where we were deserving of three\u00a0points.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The only downside to watching Freddie Potts swagger around the pitch \u2013 as former West Ham United manager…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243609,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[8633,218,1606,102251,45733,221,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-243608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-alan-pardew","tag-football","tag-freddie-potts","tag-mark-noble","tag-nuno-espirito-santo","tag-premier-league","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}