Still West Ham’s Jul
England icon Stuart Pearce has called on West Ham and the club’s fans to keep the faith in boss Julen Lopetegui following their poor start to the season.
Tipped for a top seven push at the start of the campaign, Lopetegui, who replaced David Moyes in the summer, has overseen just three Premier League wins from 11 matches.
With the Hammers losing on five occasions and sitting in 14th spot – five points above the bottom three – many fans are already demanding the Spaniard be sacked.
But Pearce, who played for the east London outfit between 1999-2001, insists Lopetegui has to be given more time to turn things around.
Discussing West ham’s situation, Pearce said: “You’ve got to understand that they made a big call in the summer to not renegotiate with David Moyes.
“They made that judgement call, they identified Lopetegui to come in and replace him.
“And after 11 games, it’s too soon [calls from fans to be sacked], there has been massive changes at West Ham, not just the coaching staff, but behind the scenes, all manner of things have changed.
“They’ve had a lot of new players come in, I thought they did really good business in the summer, but some of those players have not delivered what you would hope they would have done.
“But I think you’ve got to be a bit more patient at West Ham, I really do and I’ve said that to fans that I’ve bumped into that are a bit fidgety at this moment in time.
“They don’t think he’s the right man, but I think you’ve got to sit tight at least until the end of the season.”