What’s behind West Ham’s Olympic woe?

Last season went like a dream for West Ham United. Slaven Bilic guided the club to an impressive seventh place finish, and a spot in the Europa League, in his first season in charge whilst Dimitri Payet set the Premier League alight with his incredible free kicks. They gave the Boleyn Ground a great send off with a 3-2 victory over Manchester United and could look forward to playing next season’s football at the Olympic Stadium in front of 60,000 people.

Fast forward a few months and that dream has quickly turned in to a nightmare, on and off the pitch. London Stadium has not become the fortress they would have hoped for and indeed has been riddled with problems.

Ahead of their opening home game of the season it was announced that the club were forced to limit the capacity to 57,000 after supporters standing during their games against Juventus and NK Domzale were deemed to be unsafe. This led to some season ticket holders being unable to sit in their allocated seats.

After clashing with Bournemouth fans outside the ground, some West Ham supporters turned on themselves inside the stadium in games against Astra Giurgiu and Watford. As if that wasn’t enough to give the club a bad reputation, they have been ridiculed for allegedly playing crowd noise through the speakers to improve the atmosphere at their new ground.

With seats at the new ground so far away from the pitch, the atmosphere hasn’t been great and certainly not as good as it was at Upton Park. However, any stadium in which the home team was on a run of results as bad as West Ham are on, would be pretty flat.

The Irons have lost their last four results by an aggregate of 14-5. Had it not been for Michail Antonio’s aerial prowess they would be bottom of the table, but even so they still find themselves in the relegation zone.

Is their move to the new stadium responsible for their poor form? A new playing surface and dimensions take time to adjust to and other teams have struggled when they have moved home. When Arsenal moved to the Emirates they won just four of their first nine league matches played there. However, West Ham surely cannot use their stadium as an excuse for their poor form.

The team clearly has a problem defending, and it is not a problem that is new this campaign. Every team that finished above the Hammers last season conceded at least ten fewer goals whilst Crystal Palace, who finished in fifteenth just five points above the relegation zone, conceded the same amount.

This season they have not had a settled defence and it shows. They haven’t been helped by injuries, Aaron Cresswell and Arthur Masuaku are both currently out of action, but injuries and a new stadium are no excuse for the total lack of defensive organisation shown in recent weeks.

It is too early in the season to talk of ‘must win games’ but West Ham’s next three league fixtures are home games against Middlesbrough and Sunderland, either side of a trip to Crystal Palace. Win those and any murmurings of discontent about the new stadium will soon disappear.

Bilic has bought himself time with his performance last season, but with the money he has spent he’ll be expected to match last season’s results. A couple more defeats and the pressure will really start to mount.