West Ham appointing Moyes would be a dubious move

According to many media outlets, including Sky Sports, West Ham are set to decide on boss Slaven Bilic’s future in the next 48 hours.

The Hammers have been underperforming this season under the Croatian and on Saturday suffered a 4-1 hammering against Liverpool at the London Stadium.

The same reports claim that the Irons are already in talks with former Everton and Manchester United boss David Moyes about filling the vacancy. For me, this would be a strange decision.

Managerial has fallen apart

Many Evertonian’s are grateful for David Moyes and the way he steadied a sinking ship at Goodison Park. He turned the Toffees from a team that fought relegation on a regular basis to a team that challenged for the European spots regularly.

However, since leaving Everton for Manchester United, the Scot’s managerial career has been one failure after another. He failed at United, he failed at Real Sociedad and he failed at Sunderland.

Some will say there were mitigating circumstances. At United, the clubs hierarchy never seemed to back him in the transfer market. In Sociedad, he produced decent early results, but his lack of experience in La Liga showed in his second season.

Sunderland had been relegation strugglers for half a decade. Moyes arrived to take over a poor squad, which barely had enough quality to survive in the Championship.

Those failures have seriously hampered his reputation. Dare I say it has probably also hampered his confidence. He may believe that he is still a capable boss, but all those failures are enough to ruin any football boss.

The Scot must believe that everybody is jumping on the ‘criticising Moyes bandwagon’. However, he is being only judged on his performance at his previous clubs and they were poor.

Style if play criticised

Seen as a modern boss when he arrived at Everton, David Moyes arrival felt like a breath of fresh air at the club. However, after 11 years Moyes had failed to win silverware on Merseyside.

Toffees fans often criticised Moyes’ cautious approach and tactics. The Scot often played a very dour defensive style of football. Some claimed it was only because Moyes was working with limited players, as his transfer resources were less of a budget and more like a whip round.

However, Moyes could not use that excuse at United. Sir Alex Ferguson did not leave the best squad of players at Old Trafford, but they were good enough to play a better style than they produced under Moyes.

By all accounts, Real Sociedad’s style was much the same, while Moyes was trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear at Sunderland. He just reverted to type in the north east and it led to relegation.

Moyes would not be a popular appointment

Of course, Slaven Bilic has not yet lost his job. However, it seems only a matter of time before the London club fires the Croatian. Bilic comes across as a good guy, but good guys do not always get results.

The team are just above the Premier League relegation zone and have struggled for any sort of form in recent months. The Irons odds of suffering relegation have now dropped to 9/2, which makes the Hammers the joint-third favourites to go down.

Understandably, there is disgruntled with their team’s performances, results and position in the table from West Ham fans.

However, the potential appointment of David Moyes has led to widespread dismay on social media. Some fans even claim that they would rather keep Bilic than appoint the Scot as their new boss. It could be a very interesting international break at the London club.

The departure of Bilic is understandable. However, what the West Ham owners are thinking with the potential appointment of David Moyes is anybody’s guess.

Would David Moyes be a good appointment for West Ham?