‘In his wisdom’ Chris Sutton clearly disgusted with something Tim Steidten has done at West Ham. West Ham United director of football Tim Steidten has incurred the wrath of Chris Sutton it seems.
Tim Steidten moved to the London Stadium to become the new West Ham director of football in July 2023. He led the Hammers’ charge to sign Edson Alvarez, Mohammed Kudus and Konstantinos Mavropanos last summer.
However, it wasn’t until this summer when we saw the German’s work in all it’s glory.
After being handed the keys to the kingdom at the London Stadium, Steidten helped bring nine new players to the club.
This came after the 45-year-old played a key role in bringing Julen Lopetegui to West Ham to replace David Moyes. In the summer, Steidten promised the Hammers head coach that he wouldn’t lose any of his star players, and he kept his promise.
I think the German has been brilliant for us and the way that we work as a club behind the scenes, but Sutton clearly doesn’t agree…
Chris Sutton disgusted with what Tim Steidten did at West Ham
So it seems like Steidten has done something that has really got under one high profile pundit’s skin.
Chris Sutton was highly critical of Steidten, when writing his column for BBC Sport.
Sutton said, “West Ham supposedly replaced David Moyes because they wanted to play ‘the West Ham way’, and the Hammers’ technical director Tim Steidten was reportedly flying managers in for talks when Moyes was still in charge.“
“In his wisdom, Steidten decided to go for Julen Lopetegui, a manager with similar traits to Moyes in terms of how he is a pragmatist.“
“They spent a lot of money in the summer, about £130m on new players, but are they going to do better than last season under Moyes, when they finished ninth? I am not sure they will.“
Sutton didn’t even bother trying to hide his contempt for Steidten’s actions there did he! The thing is, he would have been under instructions from the Hammers owners to go out and find a new manager to replace Moyes.
Lopetegui is not Moyes reincarnated
Despite what some people seemingly think, Lopetegui’s playing style and system is nothing like Moyes’s. Firstly, Lopetegui likes to deploy a possession based playing style.
So far this season, the Hammers have averaged 43.3% possession, up over 2% from last season’s 41.1%. That figure is slightly skewed as well because we’ve played Manchester City and Aston Villa – two sides who like to dominate the ball.
Our other two opponents – Crystal Palace and Fulham – have the ball more than 50% of the time on average as well (FBREF). I expect us to be averaging 50% possession or more by the time the season ends.
In addition, the Spaniard likes his teams to press higher up the pitch with more aggression and intensity than Moyes’s sides ever did. Numerous West Ham players have highlighted this about Lopetegui, most recently Vladimir Coufal.
I think Chris Sutton is well wide of the mark here with his comments on West Ham director of football Tim Steidten. Maybe it’s just a misplaced loyalty to Moyes from Sutton, for whatever reason.
