How to break down and beat West Ham on Boxing Day
Let's dive into the tactics, players, and key battles that'll determine Monday's outcome
‘Tis the season. At long last, we’re here to talk about a real, live, Premier League football game. Rejoice!
The unknowns have piled up after the break, making a preview like this challenging to write. Runs of form have been interrupted, vague injuries have either happened or healed, and many teams will be rethinking their shapes and personnel decisions for the second half ahead. Predicting what happens out of the gates is a fool’s errand, but thankfully, I fit the description.
All of this is especially true of West Ham. After finishing 7th in the final year of the Mark Noble era, making it to the Europa semifinals before wearing out down the stretch, the team made several promising signings, particularly across the attack, in a bid to get further up the table. Instead, they find themselves 16th after scoring only 12 goals across 15 matches.
David Moyes will be hoping that the winter break brought the temperature down on his hot seat, while doing what he can to ensure a rejuvenated squad shows up in the upcoming slate. While it’s fair to say they have underachieved their talents—I’d rank their roster maybe, 7th or 8th in situation-independent quality?—they face dual headwinds. First, injuries have been piling up. Second, their first chance for redemption is against a first-place Arsenal.
Remember the last meeting?
Tactical overview
Here’s a loose approximation of how West Ham may line up:
Under Moyes, they play a 4-2-3-1 in possession, which merges into a compact 4-4-2 (or 4-4-1-1) in defense. I wouldn’t completely rule out tactical changes after the break, and they’ve incorporated a 5-back in the past, as well as a 3-back in a couple non-league contests before the break. While it wouldn’t be a complete shock to see that against Arsenal, they have injuries in their backline that may render it impractical, and they’re still much more likely to stay in their preferred shape.
They system is predicated on defensive solidity and dynamic countering work, with full-backs bombing ahead, the wingers inverting quickly, and the double-pivot midfield pushing everything forward. With new signing Nayef Aguerd out with an injury, their primary CB’s aren’t of a totally modern variety—they’ve been physical and slower this year—while the full-backs can be exploited in transition.
Once they’re set into their low 4-4-2, though, the back four are joined by two more big center-back quality defenders in Rice and Souček. In this low block, they are well-drilled and ever-present, pretty elite in the air, and become difficult to break down.
The transfers vs. the tactics
In a vacuum, I loved West Ham’s transfer business. They signified an evolution to a more confident, progressive style of play.
Paquetá and Scamacca are signings you make if you’re looking to evolve team identity and play further up. Paquetá, much discussed in these parts, is great as an opportunistic, expressive, pressing player — bridging the midfield and attack. Scamacca has many promising qualities, particularly as a technical goal-scorer and in the air, but isn’t a sprinter, and doesn’t create chances for others in transition (his last assist was around two years ago).
Elsewhere:
Maxwel Cornet is a player I would have loved to see join Arsenal, offering energetic depth everywhere.
Nayef Aguerd is plenty talented and modern, and did well as a center-back for Morocco in the World Cup run.
Thilo Kehrer is a starter at right-back for Germany (although a confusing selection, if you ask me).
Emerson Palmieri was brought over to provide depth to Aaron Cresswell after a season of starts for Lyon.
All promising in theory, but in practice, the team is undergoing a bit of an identity crisis.
That’s because the transfer philosophy has been totally at odds with the tactical reality. As we’ll cover, the signings signaled a progressive lean, but the team has retreated further back then ever, running one of the lowest-depth and lowest-intensity lines in the league, while dulling some of the interesting talents up front.
While they haven’t surrendered more than two goals to anyone, they’ve lost their cutting edge in attack. Along the way, they’ve blasted a lot of low-percentage shots.
Some of this is due to necessity. While Kurt Zouma has been good, he may have been battling a knock before getting surgery on his knee, and the joint pace with Craig Dawson hasn't allowed Moyes to push his CB’s to the half-line with confidence.
Some of this is also likely due to simple variance: they’ve been on the wrong end of luck, and will probably see some regression to the mean in the second half.
But because of the offside rule, football is the rare sport that allows you to have a vote in choosing where your opponent plays in attack—and there’s an option to make that further from goal. Watching the tape, I can’t help but wonder how West Ham would look with one of those more compact mid-blocks that we saw during the World Cup, and as West Ham itself employed with more frequency last year. They may have to wait for more speed to join the backline.
The players
Below are some assorted notes on the West Ham personnel. This is not meant to be conclusive, and is just my impressions after watching around five of their matches this season.
Forwards:
Up top, it’ll either be Gianluca Scamacca or Michail Antonio, or … neither, as they’re both nursing knocks right now. They offer different things: Scamacca as the 6′5”, hard-working target man and Antonio as the tireless agent of chaos, dragging defenders, holding play up, or directly creating opportunity. Antonio may be the preferred option in what is likely to be a game West Ham looks to win on the counter.
On the right, Jarrod Bowen bagged 12 goals and 10 assists last year, but has cooled off for this campaign — with only 2 goals and 0 assists so far in 22-23. In my viewing, he doesn’t look off the pace, but is getting fewer opportunities and having a howler of a year on net. He's 64th percentile at shots (2.15 per 90) and 1st percentile at shots on target (15.6%).
On the other side, Saïd Benrahma is an exciting dribbler and ball-striker on the left-wing, and there's quality starter-ish depth behind them in the form of Lanzini and Fornals (who also plays in the middle). Maxwel Cornet is working his way back to fitness after a calf injury, and will likely be out.
Unlocking Paquetá’s potential may be the key to Moyes keeping his job. He can be a difficult player to profile, with so many traits of a pure attacker, but a lot of comfort and production when he’s more regularly involved in the midfield dialog.
Midfielders:
Declan Rice has moved to a more box-to-box role on the left, instead of the deeper role he occupied for England. While he’s been good, some of his skills as a B2B can be replicated by lesser players, and I feel he has more true “1 of 1” potential as the deeper midfielder attacking in a ~1.5 pivot. If paired with a more dynamic option — simply sign Bellingham, youze Hammers — he’s better able to harness his unique skills as both a ball-player and a destroyer.
Instead, Soucek has been holding things down in the deeper positions, forming a defensive tandem. An underrated player over the last two years, to my eyes, he has retained his level defensively, but has been struggling for possessional form in a pretty straightforward, across-the-board way. He’s part of the reason for the stalled progression.
Behind them, Flynn Downes has been an interesting signing from Swansea. He’s much more of a voluminous, secure passer and can help the team maintain possession and beat the press. Plugging him in over Soucek is the kind of thing a manager in the hot seat may do.
Full-backs:
Aaron Cresswell is Aaron Cresswell. He’s been pretty exceptional at progression, chance creation, and key passes into the final third, but leaves a lot of vacated space behind him. His defending was pivotal in both legs of the Europa exit, in the worst ways. He’s also nursing a hamstring injury, and may not be fit come match day.
On the other side, Thilo Kehrer has been the preferred option of late, starting 13 games as both a CB and RB after coming over from PSG. He was exposed badly in his last two Premier League contests and may have forced Moyes into considering a change, perhaps swinging him back to the middle.
Behind them are Vladimir Coufal, Ben Johnson, and Emerson Palmieri, who each have their own bag of skills and limitations. I think Johnson projects well as a do-it-all roleplayer, capable of taking starts as they come (which he’s already done plenty). Emerson may be the Cresswell successor on the left.
Center-backs:
Kurt Zouma, who in my opinion has been the team’s best performer along with Rice, is likely out with an injury. To fill in his spot at LCB, it could be Ogbanna, Kehrer, Johnson, or Aguerd — all depending on how the injury situation plays out.
Aside from that, it looks like Craig Dawson is locked in at RCB. “Ballon d’Orson” presents physical constraints and an eye for goal (50+ in his career).
Keepers:
It’s the steady Fabiański and his likely successor, Alphonse Areola.
Overall notes on play-style
West Ham is 18th in standard possession, holding the ball only 44.4% of the time, and 14th when possession is calculated as a percentage of passes (45.8%).
They allow their opponents the highest short passing percentage (91.2%).
They are lowest in the league in terms of challenge intensity (4.6 duels tackles interceptions per minute), and 4th-lowest in terms of fouls. They run the third-lowest intensity line in the league, per PPDA (passes per defensive action).
While that seems to portend a truly parked bus against Arsenal, I wouldn’t be surprised to see some shades of pressing in spurts, particularly when starting the game. Saw a good amount of that last year.
They haven’t surrendered more than two goals in a contest, and their xGA (per Opta) is fourth in the league at 0.84 per game, behind only City, Arsenal, and Newcastle.
They are strong aerially, and have allowed 0 goals from set pieces this year.
In attack, they are solidly mid-pack in a lot of underlying statistics, but second-lowest at % of shots on target (26.3%). They’re top-five (bottom-five?) in terms of shot length, spraying a lot of balls from outside the box, with Rice and Benrahma in particular letting it rip a lot. This leads to a good amount of rebound opportunities for them, which Arsenal will have to cover.
They have the second-oldest roster (at 28.4 average age), and their record is 1-1-5 away from home.
🍖 So, how could Arsenal attack West Ham on Boxing Day?
Here are some ways Arsenal may choose to attack on Monday. I do this as more of a thought exercise than anything else, and am making a lot of assumptions about lineups and availability.
1. Stretch the block and use Tierney to achieve overloads on the left
With any compressed block, one of the first orders of business is to make it less so. So in measured possession, the aim—which Arsenal does against everyone anyway—is to stretch the play as much as possible with five attackers across the front. This increases the potential of lanes opening up in the box.
In the 2-3-5 attacking shape, it might look something like this up top:
The objective from here is to open up the half-spaces and find numerical overloads. Against West Ham, the biggest areas of opportunity are the spots between the center-backs and the full-backs, so the goal is to overburden the full-backs with responsibility.
One way to do it is by the LB (in all likelihood, Tierney) joining the outside attacking area, and instead of just overlapping every time, forming a “dual-width” partnership with Martinelli in the wide zone. With Gabriel pushing up a bit, and Partey/White/Saliba rotating over a bit to cover, this becomes a wide square instead of a triangle. The potential for Kehrer (or whoever starts) being dragged and opening up lanes is high:
Here’s an example of that wide square in action against West Ham.
In the Europa Conference League, Silkeborg scored two goals against the Hammers, including this early one. Running a 3-4-2-1 that morphed into a 5-back in defense, West Ham had even more players back than usual.
Silkeborg starts the sequence wide: while they don’t have overall attacking numbers, they have numbers out here. They play it inside and the passer immediate cuts around…
…with Rice and Lanzini rotating down, there are ample players in the box, but there are still lanes throughout because the play started so wide. This pass results in a goal:
The interplay of Tierney and Martinelli will loom large. I’d favor a bold level of commitment, giving Tierney a tremendous amount of freedom to join the front line, without always requiring somebody from that line rotating back. If Xhaka cheats in, it may present opportunities for Tierney missiles, Martinelli cutback crosses, and Nketiah tap-ins and rebounds.
In shape, this could look like a Guardiolian 3-1-6 or a 2-2-6 at times. It may present risks, but I’d operate with the assumption, not the hope, that White/Partey/Saliba/Gabriel have everything covered against a talented team who nonetheless has 12 goals this year. Tierney is also good when tracking back.
If that’s proven wrong, adjust.
2. Get the ball to Saka through changes of play (assuming he’s in the lineup)
During the World Cup, you saw France “overloading to isolate,” which means giving one side of the pitch numerical advantages like we covered above, and then switching play to an isolated 1v1 match-up.
While Arsenal won’t look as extreme as the French version, giving Saka space in a 1v1 against Cresswell or Emerson is probably a matchup that Arteta would be keen to exploit.
Teams in a low-block can lean their shape because of overloads, throw-ins, or post-transition rotations. When this happens, a Tierney-to-Ødegaard or Tierney-to-Saka change of play may be the order of business.
This worked well in the second half against Tottenham. Here’s Ødegaard accepting a change-of-play ball before delivering it to Saka. The Spurs shape is much more stretched than usual. Saka attracted two defenders, and left things wide open for a White overlap and near-goal:
The “changes of play” can be more subtle—a.k.a. not changes of play at all—and just be about finding free runners after transition. This fascinating World Cup piece by Juanma Lillo had a quote that stuck out to me when I thought about Arsenal:
“I used to say in Manchester that the last player to arrive to the box is the first one to be able to shoot. I tell that to my strikers all the time: the closer you get to the goal, the further you are from scoring.”
This can be true against West Ham. After a well-worked transition sequence, Leicester attracted a lot of close-downs on their left. Daka (purposefully?) plays the ball across to the late runner (Maddison), who slams it into the net.
If Vieira winds up with the start instead, his unexpected cuts (and balls to Eddie) could nonetheless make a nice impact on the game.
3. Win the ball ➡️ compact transitions ➡️ slanting runs ➡️ through-balls
There’s a formula here. As solid and well-coached as West Ham can be when they’re near the goal, they have limitations in transition, namely these two:
Their full-backs can venture up the pitch, and when they’re back, can struggle to coordinate effectively with the center-backs
Their center-backs lack the speed and lateral agility needed to cover runners and confidently hand players off to each other
Because of that, they’re vulnerable to a particular kind of transition opportunity. That is, when players crowd the middle and slant their runs.
We’ll do a speed round on these.
For the second Leicester goal, Pérez moved inside and enticed Dawson to come out and mark him. Pérez them blasted a long-ball through the vacated space and Barnes put it away:
Against Brighton, Mac Allister played it up the middle to Groß, who one-touched it to a cutting Troussard for the goal:
Against City—stop me if you’ve heard this before—KDB hit a through-ball to Haaland on the run, resulting in a goal:
In the 2-0 Arsenal win a year ago, both goals were scored this way. One by Martinelli and one by ESR:
As soon as you have the faster players against the center-backs, and pressure the full-backs to coordinate with the middle tandem, good things tend to happen.
Other notes
Set pieces: As noted before, West Ham is yet to concede a set piece goal, so the advantage from the Jover Joker Card is narrowed. The team should be keen to score from open play.
Shot fakes: This is more of a hunch. West Ham block a high % of shots and are good at keeping their body shape on attempts. I’d consider baiting them with a shot fake before laying it off to another runner.
Get the ball in play quickly: With any team that is tough-to-beat in their settled formation, quick throw-ins and keeper distribution can be a key to keeping them unsettled.
Cross with purpose: Arsenal had 39 crosses against the low-block of Juventus. While shorter, more purposeful crosses could pay dividends, I’m not so sure the spray-and-pray variety should be replicated.
🔥 In conclusion🔥
This will be a fascinating game to watch unfold. West Ham is more talented than they’ve let on, and Moyes demonstrated a capacity to be less negative with his tactics last year. In all, the break came at the perfect time for them, and I could see them coming out with a little bit more energy, and more disruption in their overall game — and potentially some personnel or tactical shifts that invalidate everything I’ve written here 🙃. Expect the unexpected.
Their hope for an upset would be strengthened with a fuller squad. As it stands, the probable loss of their best defender (Zouma)—as well as knocks across the pitch—combine to make that a tall order. There’s every reason to expect a comfortable Arsenal result, but that's why they play the game.
The game marks the first Premier League start for Eddie Nketiah this season. It’s a good opportunity for him. As West Ham allows possession in the middle third, the part of the game that he’s developing (dropping deep and assisting in progression) is likely to be less of a factor. Instead, it’ll probably be more about cut-back crosses, rebounds, and transition play. He can also hassle the backline into mistakes. In short, he can be himself.
It’ll be interesting to observe the energy levels, both out of the gates and late in the game. We’ll also start getting our first information about how the team as a whole copes with the absence of Gabriel Jesus.
As always, I wrote this all to learn and share, not to teach. Please pass along any corrections or clarifications as they come up, and I’m sure we’ll learn more about availability and tactics over the weekend.
Happy holidays, everybody. Your support has meant a lot this year.
Remember to watch the Bob Dylan video for “Must Be Santa” at least once, if that’s your kind of thing.
And happy grilling.
🔥
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