An empty bus pulled up outside Old Trafford yesterday lunchtime. The doors opened and off got West Ham United. Pathetic, embarrassing and ultimately humiliated, West Ham's footballers proceeded to betray their club, their history, their manager Glenn Roeder and themselves. Michael Walker reports.
So shamefully bad were West Ham it was an afterthought that they went out of the FA Cup, a competition they used to do rather well in.
There are defeats and there are defeats, but this was on such a scale that in the eyes of many of the 9,000 West Ham fans who travelled from London, Roeder's position was made untenable.
But Roeder did not resign yesterday. Nor, as of last night, had he been sacked. His hour and more after the match had been spent with Sir Alex Ferguson, who told Roeder to stick with it.
Roeder said that that is his intention - West Ham host Blackburn on Wednesday and Liverpool next Sunday in the Premiership - but it is now a question of whether West Ham stick with Roeder. "Excruciating," said Roeder, "especially that first 15 minutes of the second half. It was, to say the least, abysmal." Roeder then publicly questioned the desire of some of his players - "but for two or three".
"Each defeat is not helping my position, but I'm not a person who gives in to anything. That's how I am, that's how I've always been."
Four points minimum from Blackburn and Liverpool may enable Roeder to remain but anything less and the names of George Graham, David O'Leary and Alan Curbishley will begin to reappear. The first question each should be asked is: "Why would you want this job?" West Ham have long been lauded for their potential but yesterday it had Nationwide stamped all over it.
Although West Ham turned up with four players who had appeared in the World Cup compared with United's five, this was an authentic Cockney David v Goliath encounter. The pity was it was not Dagenham driving up the M6. Garry Hill's team would at least have played without the startling inhibition of Roeder's men.
The distress began swiftly. Toy hammers would have been more effective than Gary Breen's eighth-minute attempt at a tackle on Ruud van Nistelrooy. Van Nistelrooy pulled the ball back to Paul Scholes, whose shot was knocked away by Ian Pearce. Giggs was waiting for the rebound, though, and the ball was stroked in. West Ham's resistance had already peaked.
The visiting defence, such as it was, survived another 21 minutes before being breached again. Juan Sebastian Veron strolled down the left and found Giggs, whose first-time strike deflected off the hapless Breen and looped over David James.
"We're gonna win 3-2," chanted the West Ham fans, a depressing parody of Dagenham's. They even cheered when they won a first corner in the 43rd minute. That was the prelude to West Ham's best spell - all two minutes of it - when Fabien Barthez made saves from Lee Bowyer and Joe Cole, who tried throughout.
But four minutes after the interval van Nistelrooy swivelled on the edge of the area and planted an improvised shot high past James; one more minute and Phil Neville was in on the goalscoring act. Exchanging passes with substitute Diego Forlan, Neville clipped the ball over James.
Before the hour, Van Nistelrooy had made it five; the sixth came with 21 minutes left, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer driving a shot through James. His head was bowed by then, a ghost of a keeper in a ghost of a team.
Guardian Service
Man Utd: Barthez, Gary Neville, Ferdinand, O'Shea, Phil Neville, Beckham (Solskjaer 63), Veron (Butt 51), Keane, Giggs, Scholes (Forlan 45), van Nistelrooy. Subs Not Used: Carroll, Brown. Booked: Veron. Goals: Giggs 8, 29, van Nistelrooy 49, Phil Neville 50, van Nistelrooy 58, Solskjaer 69.
West Ham: James, Lomas, Breen (Dailly 80), Pearce, Minto, Bowyer, Cisse (Garcia 80), Carrick, Sinclair (Johnson 80), Defoe, Cole. Subs Not Used: Van Der Gouw, Hutchison. Booked: Defoe, Minto.
Referee: S Bennett (Kent).
