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Andy Carroll
David Moyes, the West Ham manager, said he thought Andy Carroll might get himself sent off against Watford. Photograph: Clive Rose/Getty Images
David Moyes, the West Ham manager, said he thought Andy Carroll might get himself sent off against Watford. Photograph: Clive Rose/Getty Images

West Ham's Andy Carroll leaves his mark on Watford but barely troubles the match

This article is more than 6 years old

Back after a six-week absence, Andy Carroll contributed little to the game other than fouls and was told he was not fit to wear West Ham’s shirt by fans

With seven seconds on the clock Andy Carroll rose to challenge Marvin Zeegelaar for a high ball and left the Watford debutant on the floor, his nose bleeding. It had not taken long for the forward to make an impression on his opponents.

In the starting lineup for the first time in six weeks, handed a new chance by a new manager, there could be no better time for Carroll to prove his worth. Perhaps with this performance he could make himself the toast of his team, acclaimed by his new coach. As it happened at half-time David Moyes sought him out for a chat, but instead of receiving a congratulatory handshake he was told that having fully considered the game and all its complexities his manager had decided that he only had another 10 minutes. By then he had been booked for tripping Richarlison – whose dramatic reaction hardly helped the situation – and had left a foot unnaturally high after falling over Christian Kabasele. “Half-time was a decision because I wasn’t sure if he was going to get himself sent off,” said Moyes. “I told him I wouldn’t take him off but I’d only give him 10 or 15 minutes of the second half.”

In the end he got 20 and when the board went up to beckon him to the bench the away fans started to sing. “You’re not fit to wear the shirt,” they chorused, the striker clearly the target of a chant that could reasonably have had a wider focus. After West Ham’s demoralising 4-1 defeat to Liverpool before the international break Carroll said that supporters “really should be staying until the end” because “you never know what’s going to happen”.

They stayed to the end this time, even though it was becoming pretty clear what was going to happen: largely to maximise their opportunity to rain abuse down on the striker. “I was surprised. I didn’t know there was anything before,” said Moyes of the bad feeling between player and fans. “I felt from the off every time Andy Carroll goes for a challenge now the opposition crowd make it really difficult and affect the referee.” It is a complaint that – unlike Carroll’s swinging arm – loses a little impact when the challenge’s subject still has blood-soaked pads stuffed up his nostrils when the final whistle is blown.

Carroll was not the supporters’ only target. The away fans made very clear their hatred for the co-owners, David Gold and David Sullivan, who had “destroyed our club”. Moyes made clear after the game his disappointment in his players, but also his bewilderment at a level of fury pouring down from the away end that was clearly beyond his most pessimistic expectations. “Look, I don’t know the history and the reasons for it, I’m only just here,” he said. “I thought they were supportive of me and I’m thankful for that. Those supporters know much better than I do the history.”

Moyes had reorganised the team, bringing in Carroll, Pablo Zabaleta and Marko Arnautovic and fielding a back four. But though they had the game’s finest chances this was a chronically disjointed performance, with Carroll far from the only player to disappoint. In the first few minutes of the second half they twice had possession and twice – Pedro Obiang and Aaron Cresswell the culprits – gently passed the ball off the pitch for no obvious reason, a period that summed up their afternoon. Not everybody disappointed, with Manuel Lanzini surely above reproach, but there were few bright spots. “There’s some players with big reputations who disappointed me a little bit,” said Moyes. “They need to show me: if that’s your reputation, show me why you’ve got it.”

His opposite number was busy showing why he has a reputation that has brought Everton to his door bearing a desperate demeanour and an outsize chequebook. Forced to produce a strategy that would make light of the absence of André Carrillo, fit only for a place on the bench because of Peru’s World Cup play-off with New Zealand in the early hours of Thursday morning, he gave Will Hughes, making his first home start, licence to float around the right flank. He was rewarded with an excellent performance, the player’s intelligence of movement, technical expertise and manipulation of angles transforming a potential weakness into an area of particular strength. Meanwhile Watford’s one known weakness, their defending from corners, was never examined by limp opponents who only won one of them.

The home fans hoisted a flag bearing a picture of their owner, Gino Pozzo, before the game kicked off and begged their manager to stay as it concluded, terrified of the kind of changes that West Ham supporters have recently seen their club subjected to.

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