Could David Moyes recall Javier Hernandez for West Ham United’s trip to the Britannia Stadium?
West Ham United manager David Moyes has told Sky Sports that his side could take a more attacking approach to Saturday’s Premier League trip to Stoke City.
The Irons have beaten Chelsea and drawn with Arsenal in the past week to renew optimism around the London Stadium, keeping clean sheets in both matches.
Moyes has settled for restraining the big clubs and hoping something will drop for West Ham, but has admitted that they must be more proactive against lesser opposition.
“Sometimes if you do that, you hang in and you stick with it then you get yourself some opportunities and I thought we’d done that at the end,” Moyes told Sky Sports after the Arsenal draw.
“I would say for the majority of the game we would have to praise the boys for how disciplined they were as defenders and how well they stuck to their task against a good team that caused us problems.
“I think it will give us good confidence because of the results. If you had given me four points against Chelsea and Arsenal… actually we were unlucky against Manchester City. We were unlucky not to equalise even after we went 2-1 down to make it two each.
“So there are good signs and maybe we can keep this level of performance up but the performances will have to change because we’ll be playing against a different type of opposition. But I’d have to say we’ve done a pretty decent job against these teams.”
The Scotsman’s comments suggest that one or two of Andre Ayew, Andy Carroll, Javier Hernandez and Diafra Sakho, who were all on the bench for the London derbies, could be set for recalls.
Of all of those attackers, Hernandez would most increase West Ham’s goal threat and could be squeezed into a forward three in the middle of Marko Arnautovic and Michail Antonio.
The Mexican poacher is West Ham’s top scorer this season with four league goals and has recently returned from a hamstring injury, although only as a substitute so far under Moyes.
Hammers captain Mark Noble would be the most likely player to be sacrificed in this bold move, with Manuel Lanzini dropping deeper into midfield in a 3-4-3 formation.
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