With a win over Rapid Vienna last night, West Ham have now secured not only knockout qualification but also top spot in the group with a game to spare. The game in two weeks at home to Dinamo Zagreb is now a complete free hit. It’s the perfect chance for Moyes to experiment with his starting eleven. With that in mind, here is my team for Dinamo Zagreb.
GK: Alphonse Areola. Other than a fantastic performance against Manchester City in the League Cup I’m yet to be entirely convinced about Areola. So there’s no point breaking his Europa League stride, no matter how much I want to see Randolph & Martin play as rolling sub goalkeepers.
RB: Ryan Fredericks. For the first fifteen minutes against Man Utd Fredericks looked really good. Other than at centre-back, right-back is our strongest position so I’d like to see Fredericks get a run out here.
CB: Aji Alese . With first place secure, now is the time to throw in a few youngsters to the mix. Alese has had a fair bit of talk around him, was on the bench against Rapid Vienna, and with Ogbonna presumably out for the season, it would make sense to give Alese a competitive match.
CB: David Moyes. With over 500 games as a player, Moyes has all the experience needed to guide Baptiste through his European debut. And at over six foot tall he’ll be a threat at set pieces as well.
LB: Russell Brand. Dinamo Zagreb do not have a single player from Greece, but let’s just pretend they do anyway. Brand was literally in a film called ‘Get him to the Greek’ so he’s perfect for man marking this tricky imaginary winger that Zagreb definitely do not have.
CM: Harry Potter. To be clear, I don’t mean Daniel Radcliffe, I mean Harry Potter. This is mostly to see how many lines @FootballCliches comes up with during the match. Plus I also like the idea of everyone convincing Radcliffe that we all genuinely believe he is a wizard and seeing how he pulls it off.
CM: Sam Allardyce. I know Allardyce was a defender but this is purely to see him suffer being played out of position, just like the likes of, Nicky Maynard, Sammy Baldock, Mohamed Diame, James Tomkins, Enner Valencia, and many others, suffered during his time as manager at Upton Park. I’d also include all the youngsters that were sacrificed in the Nottingham Forest FA Cup game.
RW: Joe Cole. The two Coles seem to be the only people willing to cover our Europa League games for BT Sport so this is mainly just to see who BT manage to force into punditry alongside Carlton for a game. I vote for Randolph & Martin.
AM: Kevin Nolan. Kevin Nolan.
LW: Jesse Lingard. According to Twitter, reposting a goal means Lingard has practically already signed for us, so why don’t we just start playing him.
ST: Fabrizio Miccoli. Miccoli played and scored for Birkirkara when they beat us one-nil in Malta in 2015. Mark Noble was caught calling him fat in that game so I thought it would be nice and awkward for everyone to get him out of retirement for this one.
All My Worst Work 