Brady Takes the Pressure off Pellegrini's Underperforming Players

All the top managers have ways of distracting media attention in order to take pressure off their players when the team is underperforming. At West Ham we have the additional mechanism of using our board to get stuck into a dispute - usually about the London Stadium - that inevitably grabs the media's interest.

And so we have the latest dispute with the stadium owners, the London Legacy Development Corporation (LLDC), who are refusing to re-erect the Hammers' honours board (that sign which shows three FA Cup wins and a European Cup Winners' Cup triumph) until the club pay allegedly outstanding bills from last year!

The signage was removed for athletic and music events during the summer and has not re-appeared yet this year. Vice-Chairman Karren Brady has accused the LLDC of attempting to hold the club to ransom to pay a fee that it is not liable for stating that "we do not owe a fee for maintenance of the big screen and it has nothing to do with the Mid-Tier Honours".

In reality, at the moment we look unlikely to add to those major honours after a shaky start to the season with what looks like an unbalanced squad. That is, of course, unless you want to add the Betway Cup to our list after we stumbled home 7-6 on penalties against Mainz in the annual preseason friendly tournament. Hmmm.