Winning Start For England
A 6-2 victory over Iran was a perfect start into the World Cup for England! Declan Rice played as a holding midfielder. Come on you Three Lions! đ´ó §ó ˘ó Ľó Žó §ó ż I’m backing England all the way!! 
Winner Enner ValenciaâŚ
Loser Football
Former West Ham star Enner Valencia scored twice in Ecuadorâs win over Qatar to give his side the win in the opening game of the controversial World Cup in the emirate which has been squeezed into the season in winter without proper time for resting the players and preparing them for the tournament.
I watched the first half of the game only by chance because we were having a late lunch (or early dinner) in a restaurant which showed the opening ceremony and the match on TV.
I would love England đ´ó §ó ˘ó Ľó Žó §ó ż to win, but otherwise lâll try to boycott the World Cup as much as I can⌠I have been a âclub over countryâ guy for many, many years now.
This is an excellent article regarding the decision to award the World Cup to Qatar:
Happy Birthday!
A new photograph has been released to mark the birthday of the King, who turns 74 today.
The image shows the King leaning against an ancient oak tree in Windsor.
The King spent his birthday privately, with no official engagements planned.
Gun salutes were fired across London, with the King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery firing 41 rounds from Green Park.
An hour later, the Honourable Artillery Company fired a 62-gun salute from the Tower of London.
Third home defeat in six days
West Ham 0 Leicester 2
Hammers go into the World Cup break a point above relegation.
âThereâs a break now, but itâs massively important that we stay positive. We will turn this around. At the moment itâs a little dip. It happens in football, not every team is unbelievable week in, week out.
âWe take it on the chin, we need to go again and be back ready for Boxing Day.â
Match report âĄď¸ WHUFC
Another disappointing result
âĄď¸ Kirk Blows column: Black week for Hammers (WHTID)
Rapid 1 LASK 0
âĄď¸ https://youtu.be/JPIUkBxsG_k
Matchberichte: âĄď¸ KURIER (euphorisch!)
âĄď¸ Der Standard (verhalten)
First home defeat since August
West Ham 1 Crystal Palace 2
-> www.whufc.com/news/hammers-beaten-late-palace-strike
For the second time in his career against Crystal Palace, Antonio made a terrible decision in the last minute of the game that proved very costly. Several years ago at Selhurst he gave the ball away when just waiting in the corner might have given us the win. Instead Zaha scored a later equalizer. Today he made a terrible pass with half the team in the box, and Palace were on the counter. After tons of just misses from Eze, Zaha, and Olise all day, the final one found the back of the net.
But a fall from grace can get much worse:
West Ham best, Austria worst team of ECL
Six wins out of their six group games – this was West Hamâs massive Europa Conference League record. The Hammers were the first club to do this in the Conference League, Europeâs third cup competition which was started last season.
Much contrary to West Hamâs record is the one of Austria Wien, the only Austrian club who qualified for this European competition: 6 games, no win, only two points. FC Vaduz, the team that eliminated Rapid Wien, and three other clubs have also got only two draws from the group stage (Shamrock Rovers from Dublin, FS Riga and Steaua Bucharest), but Austriaâs goal difference of 2:15 makes the Violets the worst of the 32 teams that qualified for the ECL group stage.
What Austria Vienna gained from their European adventure is an entry fee of EUR 2.94 mio for reaching the group stage, plus twice EUR 166,000 for the home draws against Be’er Sheva (0:0) and Posen (1:1).
Next Monday the draw for the play-offs between the runners-up of the ECL groups and the third ranked teams of the Europa League will be made. One of the winners of these games will play West Ham on the 9th and 16th of March in the round of the best sixteen teams.
Three games ahead
Itâs only a week before the English domestic season pauses until Boxing Day for the FIFA World Cup finals in Qatar. Having secured top spot and progression to the UEFA Europa Conference League round of 16, now a top half placing in the Premier League and a Carabao Cup fourth round berth are up for grabs over the next three games within the seven days.
In this final week before the break, West Ham play three times in front of their home crowd at the London Stadium. The Hammers host Crystal Palace on Sunday, Blackburn Rovers in the League Cup on Wednesday and conclude this week with Leicester at home on Saturday.
The World Cup will start on 20 November with Qatar vs Ecuador. England will play Iran in their first game of group B on the 21st.
Rapid empfängt LASK
Rapids Interimstrainer Zoran Barisic und Rapid-Legende Didi KĂźhbauer, den aktuellen LASK-Trainer, verband eine enge Freundschaft. Nun treffen die beiden am Sonntag im letzten Heimspiel des SK Rapid vor der WM- und Winterpause im Allianz Stadion aufeinander. Erstmals seit der Entlassung des Trainers KĂźhbauers durch den Sportdirektor Barisic stehen sich die beiden, die in den Neunzigerjahren gemeinsam in der damals sehr erfolgreichen Rapid-Mannschaft spielten, gegenĂźber.
âIch schätze ihn sehr, er hat mit dem LASK gute Resultate erzieltââ sagt Barisic Ăźber KĂźhbauer. âAber das Spiel lautet Rapid gegen LASK und nicht Barisic gegen KĂźhbauer”, betonte Rapids aktueller Trainer und Sport-GeschäftsfĂźhrer in Personalunion.
Seit dem Abgang von KĂźhbauer-Nachfolger Ferdinand Feldhofer Mitte Oktober fungiert Barisic auch als Coach. “Ich habe mich reinfinden mĂźssen. Aber es macht mir viel SpaĂ, am Platz zu stehen, die Entwicklung der Spieler zu sehen. Ich hoffe, dass wir die letzten beiden Spiele jetzt noch erfolgreich bestreiten”, meinte der Wiener.
KĂźhbauer legte mit dem Linzer Athletiksportclub einen fulminanten Start in die neue Bundesliga-Saison hin und rangiert nun acht Punkte vor den Rapidlern auf dem dritten Tabellen-Rang hinter Salzburg und Sturm Graz.
Wrabetz for president
Und im Anschluss an das Ende der Herbstsaison folgt dann noch ein wichtiger Termin fßr die Rapid-Mitglieder, ebenfalls im Allianz Stadion: am 26. November wird das neue Präsidium gewählt. Mit Alexander Wrabetz, dem ehemaligen Chef des Üsterreichischen Fernsehsenders ORF, gibt es nur einen Kandidaten, sodass eine Kampfabstimmung wie vor drei Jahren (Bruckner vs. Schmid) vermieden wird.
Am Freitag präsentierte Wrabetz sein Programm. Als âVizeâ ist Edeltraud Hanappi-Egger, die Schwiegertochter von Rapid-Legende Gerhard Hanappi, vorgesehen.
Sportlich wird die âListe Wrabetzâ von Rekord-Spieler Steffen Hofmann (540 Spiele/128 Tore) und Michael Hatz (269 Spiele/12 Tore) verstärkt. Im Hintergrund: Andreas Herzog soll Rapid-Botschafter werden wie auch Ex-Banker Andreas Treichl. Dabei ist auch der milliardenschwere Unternehmer und Herzog-Fan Michael Tojner (Varta), der schon das soeben fertig gewordene neue Trainingszentrum im Prater sponserte.
Das Sportbudget soll auf 30 Millionen Euro fast verdoppelt, das Gesamtbudget auf 60 Millionen angehoben werden. Wann? “Mittelfristig”. In seinem ersten Interview fĂźr Rapid-TV gab sich der designierte Präsident optimistisch, dass es bei der Wahl am 26. November groĂe Zustimmung fĂźr ihn geben wird. Hoffen wir, dass sich wirklich wieder Aufbruchstimmung beim SK Rapid einstellt!
Liverpool in Decline, WHUâs up?
âAre you a Premier League manager in dire need of a career-changing result?â Chris Bascombe in The Telegraph asks. âThe fixture list can currently be no kinder than providing a meeting with Liverpool. Last week Steve Cooperâs bottom club Nottingham Forest regenerated against Jurgen Kloppâs flailing side. This time it was Jesse Marschâs Leeds United escaping the bottom three with a notable victory.â
JĂźrgen Kloppâs Liverpool of 2022/23 has already had a bunch of bad results this season and has lost one third of their Premier League games so far (4 W, 4 D, 4 L). But only from their back to back defeats to bottom teams this impression has emanated which somehow does feel familiar to West Ham fans.
The sports writer of The Telegraph continues drawing attention to one of the Anfield greats who was sacked recently as manager: âIf Steven Gerrard was back at Anfield, he might have considered he would still be in the Aston Villa job had he had the fortune to face his old club in the last few weeks.â
Albeit it had seemed that Liverpoolâs stuttering season had gained some momentum in recent weeks with back to back wins at home against Manchester City and West Ham, this was only to be followed now by two defeats in a row to bottom teams Nottingham Forest and Leeds United.
And things got even worse now as the Redsâ home record in front of a full Anfield Road is gone after having stood for years: Not since Crystal Palace in April 2017 has a full Liverpool crowd witnessed a Premier League defeat in their own stadium (West Ham last won there in August 2015). Only the misery of lockdown football inflicted such setbacks and Kloppâs last glimmer of light in this troubling period has been that Anfield has remained impregnable. But with the 1-2 defeat to Leeds United at home this record doesnât stand anymore.
On Tuesday the Reds, already qualified for the knockout round of the Champions League after a 3-0 away win over Ajax last week, have another home game against in-form Napoli to which they already lost 1-4 in the reverse fixture in September, and then they have to travel to Tottenham. Spurs are third in the table while Liverpool slumped to ninth after the Nottingham and Leeds defeats.
A chance to leapfrog Liverpool
Liverpool could even be leapfrogged on Sunday by West Ham in the unlikely case of a Hammers win over Manchester United at Old Trafford. Although West Ham have won their fifth out of five Conference League games on Thursday and have only lost once (against Liverpool) since mid-September (when they lost to Everton away), the Red Devilsâ form seems to be even better!
Therefore such a win seams very improbable since Manchester United has – after Erik ten Hagâs and Davis Moyesâs teams had a dismal start into the season – improved much quicker then the Hammers: the Red Devils have not lost at home since the first game of the season (1-2 against Brighton) and havenât conceded a single goal at their ground since Saka scored for Arsenal in the Gunnersâ 1-3 defeat on 4 September, the only occasion in which Arsenal had to accept to be on the losing end this season so far.
But in football everything is possible – just think of yesterdayâs 1-4 defeat of Chelsea at Graham Potterâs old club Brighton. The Blues had been unbeaten in nine games since Potter took over after Tuchelâs sacking which had followed a 0-1 at the hand of Dinamo Zagreb.
Why not repeat today the heroics of West Hamâs 1-0 win in last yearâs League Cup clash at Old Trafford, and get ahead of Liverpool in the Premier League table?
Come on you Irons!
EXTRA TIME 
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