{"id":294750,"date":"2025-12-02T11:14:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T11:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/294750\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T11:14:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T11:14:08","slug":"nuno-hints-at-player-return-to-starting-xi-for-manchester-united-trip","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/294750\/","title":{"rendered":"Nuno hints at player return to starting XI for Manchester United trip"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Amidst the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.claretandhugh.info\/disgraceful-petulant-paqueta-knew-precisely-what-he-was-doing\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Lucas Paquet\u00e1<\/a>-induced fury today there are elements of Nuno Espirito \u00a0Santo\u2019s Hammers\u2019 performance that almost slipped under the radar. Changes to the starting eleven saw Soungoutou Magassa get a start whilst, controversially, the Hammers boss left out \u00a340 million Lopetegui signing Maximilian Kilman: The defender who has seemed almost an ever-present under three different Hammers head coaches found himself unceremoniously benched.<\/p>\n<p>Fit again Mavropanos actually did a half \u2013 decent job but had the usual errors \u2013 missing his header for the second Liverpool goal proved crucial but there\u2019s no real likelihood that Kilman would have done any better, such are the mediocrity of West Ham\u2019s starting centre back performances the season.<\/p>\n<p>When pressed after the game on the rationale behind Kilman\u2019s absence from the team, the head coach produced one of his now customary inscrutable answers:<\/p>\n<p>    Most Read on West Ham News<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere are many reasons behind that: The schedule, Dino has had an injury, has recovered and is working well, having [to] schedule players ahead of a quick turnaround. We are going to need all the players in the squad.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNothing\u2026 just a decision. I think Dino competed well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kilman likely to be recalled owing to the quick turnaround for the Manchester United game<\/p>\n<p>No injury then, just \u2018a decision\u2018: With the quick turnaround of another game just three days on, Nuno\u2019s words would suggest that Kilman will be back in the frame for a start against Manchester United. Neither of the duo show the signs of improving their game that have been clear from the Hammers\u2019 third centre back Jean-Clair Todibo who was pretty again yesterday.<\/p>\n<p>Todibo appears to have upped his game \u2013 and his fitness \u2013 in a way that the other centre back pair urgently need to follow. Neither option looks capable or partnering \u2018JCT\u2019 to the much desired clean sheet defensive shutout on Thursday, whether it be Kilman or Mavropanos who get the nod from their manager.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Amidst the Lucas Paquet\u00e1-induced fury today there are elements of Nuno Espirito \u00a0Santo\u2019s Hammers\u2019 performance that almost slipped&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294751,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[218,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-294750","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294750","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=294750"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294750\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}