Legend
On the night Mark Noble became one of only 10 players in the last 120 years to make 500 first team appearances for West Ham Utd.
Noble, born 8 May 1987, has played almost all of his youth and first team football for the club apart from two short loan spells at Hull City and Ipswich Town in 2006. His loyalty and services to the club have earned him the nickname “Mr. West Ham“.
He now is part of the small and illustrious group of players who played 500 first team games in Claret and Blue
Vic Watson, Jimmy Ruffell, Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst, Billy Bonds, Frank Lampard Sr, Trevor Brooking, Alvin Martin and Steve Potts
Mark Noble quite rightly takes his place among those legends.
Born in Canning Town, East London, Noble played for Barking Colts and moved to Arsenal‘s academy at age 11. Local side West Ham United showed an interest and Noble signed as a youth player. He became the youngest player ever to appear in their reserve team, aged 15 and made his debut in the senior team at the age of just 17 in the League Cup in August 2004 in a 2–0 win against Southend United. He made his league debut in the Championship in January 2005, in a 4–2 defeat away at Wolverhampton Wanderers. On 30 May 2005, Noble played in the 2005 Football League Championship play-off Final which saw West Ham beat Preston North End 1–0 to secure a return to the Premier League. He had entered the game as an 82nd-minute substitute for Shaun Newton.
Noble scored his first goal for West Ham against Brighton & Hove Albion, the side’s first of three in a 3–0 home win in January 2007 in the third round of the FA Cup, from an assist by Carlos Tevez. On 4 March, he scored his first Premiership goal and the opening goal of the game, against Tottenham at Upton Park in a game West Ham eventually lost 4–3 in the final seconds. He was in tears on the pitch afterwards, but in the end he helped West Ham securing Premier League status in their “Great Escape” of the 2006–07 season. He played 11 games in all competitions, scoring three goals in that season.
In 2012 he helped West Ham regain their Premier League status in the play-off final at Wembley, being part of a promotion winning team for the second time in his career.
He has played for England at U16, U17, U18, U19 and U21 levels. He captained the U21 side, scoring three goals in 20 appearances. Despite appearing for England at numerous youth levels, he never was capped for the full international side.
Noble has played more Premier League games for West Ham than any other player, in addition to being the longest serving player in their current squad, having been in the first team since 2004. He is West Ham’s first-choice taker for penalty kicks and has won the club’s Hammer of the Year trophy twice, as well as being voted Hammer of the Decade at the end of the 2010s.
In 2014, Noble was ranked in the top five penalty takers in the top European leagues and was in the top 10 in the world based on the percentage of penalties successfully converted since 2009.
2015 he took over from Kevin Nolan as Club Captain and “has proved himself to be the inspirational leader we all knew he would be,” as West Ham’s joint Chairmen David Sullivan and David Gold put it in their message of honour on his 500th appearance for the Club.
In his first season as a skipper Noble steered the team to an unforgettable final season at the Boleyn Ground, and he has been a constant and comforting source of reliability during the first few seasons at London Stadium.
Noble (33) is one of only 10 players in the last 120 years to make 500 first team appearances for West Ham Utd. And in his 500th game on Friday evening, he once again led his team-mates into a crucial battle and stood up to be counted, marking this appearance with another typically committed and influential performance from the centre of midfield, helping secure Premier League status for the Club that he’s giving blood, sweat and tears for in every single game he walked on to the pitch.
Born in east London, and bleeding Claret and Blue like the supporters of this great Club, Mark Noble always has been acknowledged as “one of us”. He’s a fantastic servant to West Ham United and will forever be remembered as “Mr. West Ham” in times to come
What a legend!
A message from the Joint-Chairmen to Mark Noble:
https://www.whufc.com/news/articles/2020/july/18-july/message-joint-chairmen-mark-noble
Virtually safe!
West Ham “deserve to be in the Premier League” says captain Mark Noble, after his side’s blistering first-half performance ensured a victory that virtually secures their top-flight status but leaves Watford in major trouble. (BBC)
Prior to the match, manager David Moyes had asked his players to “promise less and deliver more” and they did just that in a terrific first-half showing that eased any nerves.
The Hammers started brightly and scored two goals within ten minutes (goals: Michail Antonio who is the most prolific player post-lockdown with seven goals since the restart, and Tomas Soucek, excellent again in midfield). And when Declan Rice made it three before halftime, it was almost clear that the Irons would pick up a crucial win.
With their 3-1 victory over Watford they have moved six points clear of the relegation zone with two games remaining and, with a goal difference that is also significantly better than their rivals’, the Hammers’ place in the top flight seems assured.
David Moyes said: “We are in a good position. Teams still have that chance and we have to do that job. Even scoring the goals has helped – I wanted us to keep our goal difference as good as it could be.
Mark Noble, who came through the club’s academy and made his 500th appearance in the match, said: “It’s an amazing day for me, my family – this club deserves to be in the Premier League and tonight went a long way to achieving that.
“Seventeen or 18 years ago I was trying to sneak into Upton Park without a ticket. To play 500 games for the club you grew up supporting, grew up half a mile away from here, your family support – it’s what dreams are made of,” Noble was beaming.
With two games to play and 37 points, the gaffer still wants more: “We still have a couple of games to go. If we get 40 points we’ll have done it off our own back,” David Moyes said.
Forward Antonio, fresh from scoring four against Norwich in the previous game, took his tally to nine for the season with his goal in the sixth minute: it was a calm, left-footed finish to set the Hammers on their way.
Soucek‘s flying header and Rice‘s delightful long range shot ended the game as a contest, despite there being nearly an hour still to play.
The second half still cost me some nerves because Watford made it 3-1 through Troy Deeny quite early and pressed for a second goal.
But after half an hour West Ham regained their grip on the game, and in the end the Hammers could celebrate to be virtually safe and remain in the Premier League.
The remaining fixtures of the teams in 15th – 19th place are:
West Ham: Manchester Utd (A), Aston Villa (H)
Brighton: Newcastle (H), Burnley (A)
Watfordjh : Man City (H), Arsenal (A)
Bournemouth: Southampton (H), Everton (A)
Aston Villa: Arsenal (H), West Ham (A)
WHU v Watford 3-1, extended highlights: https://www.whufc.com/news/articles/2020/july/18-july/extended-highlights-west-ham-united-3-1-watford
Geschafft!
Mit einem 3:1-Sieg über Watford liegt West Ham nun zwei Runden vor Schluss sechs Punkte vor dem ersten Abstiegsrang und kann praktisch sicher sein, dass man auch nächstes Jahr in der Premier League spielen wird.
Mit 3:0 ging es in die Halbzeit, aber nachdem die Hornets gleich zu Beginn der zweiten Hälfte das 1:3 erzielten und ständig im Vormarsch waren, wurde es noch eine Zitter-halbe-Stunde, bevor West Ham – je länger das Spiel dauerte – eine Sicherheit zurückgewann und schließlich als 3:1-Sieger vom Platz ging.
Das Spiel habe ich im Salon des renovierten Thalhofes in Reichenau gesehen und nun feiere ich hier allein im Thalhof den im leeren London Stadium errungenen Klassenerhalt!
Jetzt kann ich mir ein Schluckerl genehmigen! I’m forever blowing bubbles! Come on you Irons!
What a score at halftime!
A fantastic score at halftime for West Ham! The Hammers lead the Hornets 3-0 at London Stadium.
In the sixth minute of this crucial relegation decider, Michail Antonio continued his hitting streak and scored his fifth goal in succession. And just four minutes later Tomas Soucek’s header made it 2-0 for the Irons!
Then Declan Rice got on the scoresheet with only his third Premier League goal, making it 3-0 in the 36th minute with a precisely timed long range effort!
A win would mean that West Ham have leapfrogged Brighton and would sit in 15th with a six-point-gap between them and Aston Villa in 18th! Things look bright now for David Moyes’s men!
Come on you Irons, let’s win this one and finish the business! Then let’s celebrate staying up!
But there’s still one half to go …
A crucial game ahead
Tonight West Ham play Watford at home (in an empty London Stadium) and could already reach their goal of staying up if they manage to beat their fellow strugglers. With Aston Villa and Bournemouth failing to win their matches this round, West Ham would be six points ahead of the relegation zone with only two games to play if they achieve a victory over Watford. Albeit not mathematically safe, due to their superior goal difference the Hammers could start planning another season in the Premier League and David Moyes could begin reshaping the club.
But as we all know, we should never take anything for granted at West Ham. A victory over Watford isn’t unlikely at all, as West Ham’s form has improved and Tomas Soucek and especially Michail Antonio are a real threat for their opponents’ defence now. But in recent weeks a win over Chelsea and a draw at Newcastle were followed by a disappointing loss to Burnley, and inconsistency has been some kind of a “trademark” to this Club for quite a long time. Therefore nobody would be very surprised if West Ham suffer an other setback by losing this crucial game tonight. Having to play Manchester United in the penultimate game of the season, then the relegation battle could go down to the wire with strugglers Aston Villa coming to the London Stadium in the last round.
It’s this habit of “bursting bubbles” shortly after they have started to fly, which David Moyes wants to change. The manager wants a cultural reset – away from the view he had of West Ham when he was at Everton, namely of a “flaky, inconsistent” side.
That is a view that was reinforced by one of his earliest memories from the first time he was appointed manager in November 2017, when Watford were his first opponents.
“My biggest memory from that night was Marko [Arnautovic] coming off with a sore finger,” said the Scot. “I thought ‘my goodness, what is this I have got here?’.
“It was my perception [that West Ham were soft] and a lot of managers would still see it that way. It is something we need to change. We have to alter that culture.”
Moyes points to a word he heard during lockdown: “One of the things I heard in lockdown came from the Archbishop of York. He said ‘promise less, deliver more’. That has to be a bit of West Ham,” said Moyes ahead of tonight’s game against Watford.
“We can’t keep promising that we are going to go so high. We were in a difficult position when I arrived and we are still in it. Away in the distance is a wee spot of light and we are aiming to get to it.”
West Ham’s first victory this season back in August was an away win over Watford with Sébastien Haller scoring his first goals in front of a packed Vicarage Road. Mark Noble made his 468th appearance for the Hammers in the 15th anniversary of his debut for the Club. It was a different kind of world inside and outside the football ground back then, and nobody would have expected the very different kind of mood in which the reverse fixture is played now.
However, the bubbles machine will let the soap bubbles fly tonight in London Stadium when the teams step onto the pitch, and the melody of the Hammers’ “Bubbles” song will be heard from the stadium speakers ahead of the game. But there will be no crowd to sing along and a no goose bumps will arise in the stands when the music stops, as there won’t be 55,000 or more supporters to clap their hands and belt out “UNITED UNITED” to cheer their team to victory. With no “claret and blue army” present, just the owners and staff and a small number of other people are allowed inside the ground. Hopefully they will be able to watch what could be an almost final step to achieving the goal David Moyes has been appointed for a second time. Back in 2018 he had “done his duty“ and was replaced by a manager of – supposedly – “higher calibers” when the Board decided to hire former Manchester City and Real Madrid coach Manuel Pellegrini.
This time round it is all but secure that David Moyes will remain in his managerial position if he guards West Ham to safety. When he came back to London in December he said that he refused to consider surviving Premier League relegation a “success” and insisted that in the long term his ambitions sat far higher than that.
But Moyes is keen not to get carried away with thoughts of next season. In his press conference he refused to agree victory against Watford would secure a ninth successive top flight season and, after a difficult start to his second tenure, when he won only two of his first 12 Premier League games, he noted his hair has changed a bit.
“There are a lot of grey hairs but I don’t think anyone would have expected anything else,” he said.
Let’s hope that no more grey will be added to the Scot‘s head tonight and bubbles will not fade and die this time.
Come on you Irons!
Derzeit keine “Air Bridges” von UK nach AUT
Für die schon bisher vom österreichischen Landeverbot betroffenen Staaten wird sich einstweilen nichts verändern: Flüge aus
– Weißrussland (Belarus),
– China,
– Großbritannien,
– dem Iran,
– Portugal,
– Russland,
– Schweden
– und der Ukraine nach Österreich sind weiterhin untersagt.
Ab Donnerstag dürfen auch Flugzeuge aus den Westbalkan-Ländern
– Albanien,
– Bosnien-Herzegowina,
– Kosovo,
– Montenegro,
– Nordmazedonien,
– und Serbien,
– sowie aus Bulgarien,
– Rumänien,
– der Republik Moldau und
– Ägypten nicht mehr in Österreich landen.
Deutliche Auswirkungen hat das auch auf das Streckennetz der AUA: Aktuelle Verbindungen aus Belgrad, Bukarest, Kairo, Podgorica, Sarajevo, Sibiu, Skopje, Sofia, Tirana und Varna nach Wien-Schwechat müssen zumindest bis Ende Juli gestrichen werden.
Four-goals-Michail in the Footsteps of the Eighties
“Scoring four goals is an amazing feeling” (Michail Antonio, 11 July 2020)
Three hundred and eighty five games into his senior career, Michail Antonio has achieved plenty.
But on the 386th he took a step he had never taken before to give West Ham United a huge three points at Norwich City on Saturday.
Antonio netted his first senior hat-trick to help the Hammers to a 4-0 victory, and even better than that, he notched all four goals on a remarkable afternoon for the visitors.
In doing so, he became the first Hammer since David Cross to score four in a game – and that came back in September 1981 – so it was without surprise that the No30 wore the broadest of smiles after the final whistle.
Forward David Cross played for West Ham from 1977-1982. He won the FA Cup with West Ham in 1980 (1-0 against Arsenal, goal: Trevor Brooking) and was the Division 2 Golden Boot winner of the 1980/81 season. He scored four goals in a game on two occasions, against Grimsby Town on 11 April 1981, and against Tottenham Hotspur on 2 September 1981.
On 1 October 1980, Cross scored West Ham United’s first, and to date only, hat-trick in European competition in a 5–1 win against Castilla.
Within the current season, fifty years after West Ham’s last win of silverware, one of the Club’s goalkeepers is David Martin, son of Alvin Martin who was a member of the FA cup winning team of 1980. And now Michail Antonio follows in the footsteps of David Cross, an other hero of that generation!
Clockwise: Alvin Martin and his son David, Trevor Brooking celebrating his 70th birthday last year, four goals-heroes David Cross and Michail Antonio
40 years 1 month and 1 day from today FA Cup Final 1980
Happy Hammers: revisiting West Ham’s triumph: West Ham 1 Arsenal 0 https://www.theguardian.com/football/triumph-in-pictures
Video 1980: West Ham 1-0 Arsenal https://youtu.be/B0Iwn9o86HM
Video 2020: Norwich City 0-4 West Ham
https://www.whufc.com/news/articles/2020/july/11-july/goals-norwich-city-0-4-west-ham-united
Four goals, that’s six points clear
West Ham have convincingly beaten Norwich on Saturday afternoon with Michail Antonio scoring all four goals. The Hammers mustered their first away win since David Moyes has taken over in January and are now six points clear of the relegation zone with only three games to go.
Michail Antonio is the first West Ham player to score four goals in a top-flight match since David Cross in 1981Norwich are relegated with this seventh successive league defeat which left Daniel Farke’s side anchored at the foot of the table, 13 points from safety with only three games – and a maximum nine points – to play.
Norwich’s third relegation in seven seasons was sealed by Antonio’s superb performance in front of goal.
The forward volleyed the first from inside the six-yard area after Issa Diop’s flick from a corner before using his head to guide Mark Noble’s free-kick beyond Tim Krul.
Hammers skipper Noble also provided the ball over the top for Antonio’s hat-trick. Krul saved his initial shot but it fell invitingly for the West Ham player to head over the line. His fourth was a tap-in after Ryan Fredericks’ pass.
West Ham’s first Premier League away win under David Moyes lifts them six points above the relegation zone, with two of their remaining three matches at home to fellow strugglers Aston Villa and Watford (winning 2-1 over Newcastle at the same time) and an away game against Manchester Utd.
Michail Antonio: “Being the first player to score four goals in one game for West Ham in the PL is an amazing feeling”
Match report: Norwich City 0-4 West Ham United: Michael Antonio scores four to send Canaries down
Masked Britain
FACE MASKS will become mandatory in shops and enclosed spaces, Boris Johnson has indicated, as he said it was time for the country to “go back to work”, The Telegraph reports.
The Prime Minister, who posed in a face covering for the first time yesterday, said the Government needed to be “stricter” on enforcing guidelines for wearing them indoors.
He said: “It’s very important that people should be going back to work if they can now. I want to see more people feeling confident to use the shops, use the restaurants, get back into work, but only if we all follow the guidance.”
On Tuesday, Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor, announced £30 billion in giveaways to encourage “cautious” people to return to pubs, restaurants, shops and attractions, which were allowed to reopen last weekend. Many retailers have remained closed, particularly in town centres, as office workers on whom they rely for much of their trade were still mostly working from home.
Endlich wieder nach England
Endlich ist es soweit: ab Freitag, dem 10. Juli, wird die Quarantänepflicht für Besucher aus Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz bei der Einreise nach England aufgehoben. Die britische Tourismusorganisation Visit Britain freut sich, bald wieder Urlaubsreisende in England begrüßen zu dürfen.
Ob Wanderungen an der Küste oder entspannte Ausflüge ins Grüne – bald ist es wieder möglich, die Schönheiten und Eigenarten der Insel zu besuchen und zu erleben.
Viele der Sehenswürdigkeiten haben unterschiedlichste Möglichkeiten erarbeitet, um ihre Besucher wieder willkommen zu heißen – von reservierten Zeitfenstern und begrenzten Besucherzahlen bis zu Einbahnstraßen-Regelungen. Diese Maßnahmen sollen sicherstellen, dass man den Besuch in Großbritannien genießen kann.
Eine Eigenart des von mir absurderweise geliebten Fußballklubs West Ham United – dass auf ein gutes Match und einen wichtigen Sieg gegen ein favorisiertes Team wie Chelsea meist unmittelbar eine Enttäuschung auf dem Fuße folgt – würde ich allerdings nicht live im Stadion erleben können: die beiden obersten englischen Fußballligen werden auch ab dem 10. Juli weiterhin ohne Zuschauer in den Stadien auskommen müssen. Blowing Bubbles gibt‘s daher nur vor dem Fernseher! Allerdings hat der Klub auf der Tribüne Billy Bonds Stand Fotos von 1900 Fans installiert:
Unabdingbar ist vor einer Reise eine Information über die aktuellen Hinweise der britischen Regierung und der Regierung des eigenen Landes. ▶️Jetzt informieren
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