One step forward, two steps back; there is no denying this was a desperately disappointing result against a side that always seem to do us at home. That's bad enough, but, like last season, the result was a travesty as the Hammers deserved something from a game they dominated for long periods. Everton's goals came against the run of play and picking the ball from the net seemed to be the only thing Rob Green had to do all afternoon.

But, we lost and undid the good work of mid-week, been dumped back into the trouble zone and also, once gain, surely given the fragile confidence a knock. So what went wrong?

There were three minutes of a four minute period of stoppage time on the clock when young Zavon Hines swivelled and hit home a precious goal to give West Ham a 2-1 win against Aston Villa. The crowd erupted and I, for one, can't remember the last time I've been hugged by so many fat, bald blokes (?). It was late - very late - but I didn't think it was anything less than West Ham deserved for a battling display that was full of conviction, tenacity and good football. In fact, this was a cracking match with both sides showing good form.

I suppose, for the sake of symmetry, I should say this is a draw that felt like a defeat as the Hammers had done to them what they did to Arsenal last week; but that would be a lie as Sunderland bossed the second half and a point seemed only fair and was, in any case, probably a result I would have taken before the game began.

Gianfranco Zola though looked dispirited after the match and was obviously annoyed at the way the Hammers let a two goal lead slip away by allowing the home side to dominate for long spells in the second half even though they were down to ten men for most of it.

This was a draw that felt more like a win and the home point, perhaps, may represent a solid base that could kick start West Ham's season, such was the impact felt in pulling back a two goal deficit from a strong Arsenal side who looked solidly in command until the final 15 minutes of the match.

It would be unfair to suggest that West Ham were outclassed by Arsenal until the latter stages; certainly in the first 15 minutes the Hammers had given as good as they got, but, once the home side were forced to chase the game after poor defensive errors, there is no doubt that the likelihood of a Hammers comeback looked extremely unlikely. I'm ashamed to admit at one stage that I was just hoping that the score finished 2-0 rather than it turning into a rout.

I can't help but feel that West Ham are trying to fulfill a self-perpetrating prophecy here. A few weeks back, with less matches played than their rivals and only two home games, one against local rivals who've got a bit of a sign on us currently and Liverpool, who we've not beaten since referees last wore top hats, we find ourselves in the lower reaches of the division. "Woe is us - it's relegation" scream the knee-jerkers and, all of a sudden, we start playing like a relegation haunted team; Confidence drains away and top players - not the ones usually open to fans criticism - suddenly start looking second rate. Saturday's game was a case in point.

Well thanks, West Ham. I have been telling all and sundry this week that the Hammers position in the bottom three was mainly down to the vagaries of the fixture list, and that our real direction would be revealed when we played Fulham. On this showing though, I'd have to admit that direction may be backwards!

One up against ten men with only a last gasp equaliser to spare the blushes, is really not good enough at this stage. More worringly, the lack of onfield leadership, defensive mistakes, bad luck and positional confusion is merely giving ammunition to neutrals and pessimistic fans who sense that a season long fight against relegation is the best we can hope for. It should have all been so different though.

I'm not employed by Soccernet and I'm nothing to do with Radio Five Live; I was born and raised in the east end of London and I support West Ham - the name is on my birth certificate. Therefore, I do not have go overboard in praise of a team that have spent hundreds of millions of pounds, nor abuse a cash-strapped lightweight side who struggle when injuries occur. I will merely say that West Ham's season gets under way at home to Fulham on Sunday and leave it at that.

As I heard the City team being named as I drove to the 'Fustillian and Bucket' to watch this game on ESPN, it wasn't the names of Tevez, Wright-Phillips or Bellamy that made me groan aloud but rather that of Martin Petrov, returning from injury, one of the myriad of players who seems to love playing against the Hammers.

Less a match report - I've neither the money nor the wherewithal to travel to Bolton in mid-week currently - more a match moan.

I don't know why I let Carling Cup defeats like this get to me - God knows I should be used to them by now - but they always do. I said before the season began that I always think this competition is a way for a club like West Ham to bring some silverware back to the boardroom. Working on the premise that we are a mid-table club then, if we put out a decent side and play to our potential, then we should only be concerned about the clubs above us and when most of them send kids out until the final is it really asking too much to get further than the 3rd round occasionally?

West Ham's Liverpool hoodoo struck yet again as the men from Anfield came away from Upton Park with all three points in an action packed game. Liverpool will probably point to a period of second half domination as cause for celebration, but the Hammers will equally bemoan some injury woes that ensured their three substitutes would be used just to replace limping players, at a time when they could have done with some tactical opportunities.

It could have been so different though had the excellent youngster Zavon Hines made the most of a glorious chance after only two minutes when he robbed defender Carragher - who looked unsteady against the attacker all evening - and shot against the post. Fair play though, Reina came out quickly and replays later showed that Hines probably did well to even bend the ball onto the post.

I've seen none of this game at all. I could blame it on the fact that I'm currently painting my bathroom and I was tired, or lay the guilt firmly on the extended 'Last Night of the Proms' coverage that meant that Match of the Day started later than usual but, whatever the reason, the fact is I fell asleep before Paul Scholes was sent off in the Spurs v ManU game and woke just in time to hear Gary Linekear announce '..and now for our last match we travel to Wigan..' (no surprise there then - West Ham must figure in more last match scenarios than any other club!). Despite this fortutious intervention on my sleep pattern though, I then went straight back to sleep again or, if I was awake, then the match was even worse than I feared and I've wiped it from my brain.

I've seen nothing of the Blackburn game at all - even the MOTD 'highlights' eluded me - but I understand from those who did go that nothing happened. Can I just repeat that: NOTHING HAPPENED. Sooo.... in keeping with the fact I like to keep this area fresh and free from anything that might be construed as normal behaviour, I'd like to tell you about the match I did go to and that was Colchester's home game with Leeds at the new Community Stadium. Why Colchester? Well, you might not know this but, since moving away from my beloved East End five years ago, I actually live within a stone's thrown or spitting distance of the new Colchester United ground and, in fact, I quite often spit and throw a stone in that general direction.

The years rolled back at Upton Park on Tuesday night as '70's terrace hooliganism returned to East London in scenes that could have come directly from another 'straight to bargain bin' sequel of 2005 film 'Green Street'.

This time though there was no Frodo Baggins and no socio-macho altercations posing as entertainment; this time the violence was real and meant at least one man was stabbed as over 200 police in riot gear tried to quell the violence as bottles and bricks were thrown in pre-match street battles that were later described as 'large scale trouble'.

Life imitating 'Art'? Well, this was always going to be a powder keg of a match and trouble was never going to be far from the surface but perhaps the Police were a little unprepared for scenes that some fans won't have seen before, but which will remind older supporters of days when supporting your team was a darker and more dangerous occupation.

I wasn't in particularly good humour as I approached this game and I was in even less of one after. I've long maintained that the football season starts too early and goes on too long and this game in particular - a red-blooded local derby guaranteed to warm the cockles on a cold autumn or winter day - was not aided by being played on a baking hot Sunday lunchtime when the attention of most sensible people should have been on Steve Harmison bearing down from the Vauxhall End rather than Cole peppering the Sir Trevor Brooking Stand.

We all know it's a marathon and not a sprint, but it is a deeply satisfying to start the season with an away win, and even better when the performance is as comprehensive as this.

West Ham were comfortable winners at Molineux with a goal in each half from first, England under-21 captain Mark Noble, and then new club skipper and England centre-half Matthew Upson on 69 minutes. Wolves weren't without attacking options though and Robert Green was in fine form to deny the home side. Quite why England think they have a goalkeeping problem when Green is available is puzzling; if Robert played for a top four club then nobody would doubt his ability.

Carlton Cole and Junior Stanislas both scored in the 2-1 defeat of Middlesbrough to round off the season in fine style and condemn Boro to relegation.

On a baking hot day in East London, the football looked a little leaden at times and there was very much an 'end of term' feel to proceedings despite the fact that the media had tried to buoy Boro's hopes of survival. In fact, the Teeside club and its fans had obviously already decided their fate, as there was none of the desperation and urgency usually associated with these matches and Boro only had a few hundred fans follow them down for their last hurrah.

West Ham's Euro hopes disappeared with defeat at Goodison Park; a game in which James Tomkins saw a straight red and the Hammers finished rather in disarray.

It all looked so good when Radoslav Kovac opened his account with his new club, scoring spectacularly from 25 yards in the 24th minute after Everton had made a strong start, but the game changed after 38 minutes when Tomkins was adjudged to have tripped Tim Cahill, Everton were awarded a penalty and the Hammer's defender was sent off.

You know it's going to be a bad day when you've been unintentionally held up and get to the match or the pub a minute or so after kick-off, just in time to see the opposition roll the ball into your net...

Of course, for West Ham it's Liverpool in general and Steven Gerrard in particular, and we should all really be used to it by now so, what can only be described as a bit a pasting, didn't really come as any great surprise. As I've said earlier, the Hammers can hold their own against the Stoke's and Fulham's of this world but, with what is esentially the season's fourth and fifth choice forward line, this side aren't really likely to give a team like Liverpool much in the way of sleepless nights.

Another good away win for the Hammers against a team who, rather like West Ham, have rather flown in under the radar this season. This was Stoke's first home defeat of 2009 and only their fourth at home all season and rather negates the 'well, whaddya expect?' opinion I got from Blagg Jnr when I told him the result.

Stoke City are a tricky mob at the best of times but when, as they did in the second half in this game, they give their all to the cause backed by a vociferous home crowd, they become even more difficult to handle.

Petr Cech's superb penalty stop from Mark Noble gave Chelsea all three points at Upton Park and provided a welcome boost to the visitors, who face the rather more daunting challenge of Barcelona in the semi final of the Champions League on Wednesday.

Salomon Kalou's 55th minute opener for Chelsea followed excellent work by Frank Lampard, who responded to the inevitable abuse with the equally inevitable solid performance. I doubt either of these things will ever change.

Some newspapers had this down as a lucky point for West Ham but I'm not sure why. True Villa went ahead as early as the 11th minute while West Ham's equaliser came in the 85th and Villa did have several chances to stretch their lead in the first half and the Hammers would surely have had trouble recovering from that.

But a quick look at the match statistics will show that the Hammer's forced as many corners as Villa and had the main percentage of the possession and, once Saviola and Sears were introduced in the 74th and 81st minutes respectively, the Hammers constantly stretched the home side's rearguard to the extent that it looked like any third goal would come from the visitors.

Roman Pavlyuchenko's solitary second half strike was enough to earn Tottenham the 'double' over West Ham this season and, sadly, bragging rights for the 2008/09 season.

You'd have to say that Spurs probably deserved this victory though; the Hammers didn't create enough in the final third and missed the influence and menace of Cole and Parker. The Hammer's only real chance came shortly before Pavlyuchenko's winner, when Di Michele should have done better when he raced through Woodgate but seemed not to realise how much time was available when giving Gomez the chance to save.

This really was an inspiring win. With Scott Parker out and Carlton Cole - injured playing for England in mid-week - expected to be sidelined for six weeks, there is no doubt that the Hammers looked as if they would find goals difficult to come by and, with Sunderland desperate for points, this had the air of one of those games where the struggling side might expect to upset the more fancied hosts.

However, Zola's promise to give the kids a run-out turned out to be more than just giving them first team experience, as Junior Stanislas and the increasingly impressive James Tomkins, both scored to give the Irons a richly deserved victory.

If Blackburn fans were looking to gain three easy relegation-busting points against a team that looked tired and jaded just five days before, then they obviously hadn't looked at the past meetings between these two sides.

To say that West Ham are Blackburn's bogey side is an understatement and, with wins by the Lancashire side against the Hammer's about as rare as hen's teeth, some people might look at the territorial advantage gained by the home side in this match and opine that the curse had struck again.

Good grief! Just how bad was this? I fully expect to see a new dictionary definiton of 'poor' appearing in the standard Oxford next year; it will read simply WHU 0 WBA 0 - 16th March 2008.

There was no excitement, no shots, no atmosphere and nowhere to hide. Both sides seemed content to come away with a point and I'm not sure if this says less about the Hammers than the Baggies. West Ham can claim to have been seriously understrength with injuries and suspensions but even that doesn't excuse the lack of urgency and the constant back passes to Robert Green.

I won't waste your time with this one as I only saw some brief highlights on Match of the Day, and the chief concerns on that viewing were a superbly worked West Ham goal that ultimately won the match, and some appalling tackling and crazy referring decisions that seemed to puzzle just about everyone apart from match ref Stuart Atwell.

In a nasty game that threatened to spill over on several occasions both Scott Parker and Lucas Neill could count themselves lucky to finish the game on the pitch while Carlton Cole, dismissed for a second bookable when his high leg collided with Boyce's low head, could justifiably ask if that, or the earlier booking for a late tackle, deserved so much as a yellow.

A poll on the WestHamOnline site surprisingly revealed that an overwhelming majority of fans thought West Ham would lose this game. The Hammer's recent poor form may have something to do with it; then again City's abysmal away record suggested the run must end somewhere – and that somewhere was more than likely to be Upton Park (we have a record of this type of thing!).

More likely though was the fact that the Hammers faced that hardiest of foe; the sold striker coming back to wreak havoc on his old club and, being as Bellamy had an excellent record against his former clubs - and there are now a helluva lot of 'em - the fans seemed to fear the worst.

West Ham slumped out of the FA Cup as Middlesbrough finished off what they threatened to do at Upton Park two weeks ago; the Smoggies generally out muscling and out playing a disappointing Hammers outfit.

The whole evening wasn't helped by the bizarre circumstance of ITV showing the replay on a night that Sky were covering two games in something called the Champions League, said games involving Chelsea, Inter Milan, Liverpool and Real Madrid. There are some people out there who prefer this type of tedium and they were all in the same pub!

The classic phrase is 'a game of two halves'; but this represented a game of 80 minutes against 10 (You can do the maths and tell me what that represents!).

Two goals down after 11 minutes, West Ham looked down and out on a ground they have never won on and against opponents who seem to have the 'sign' on us. If that wasn't bad enough, Kevin Davies - who would surely be picked for England if he had to face the Hammers every week - scored his inevitable goal against his favourite opponents.

A frustrating afternoon at Upton Park, as a lacklustre and strangely off the pace home side struggled in a cup-tie that they must have had good hope of winning on current form.

Herita Ilunga's late goal gave West Ham a draw that they will probably relish, as there was a definite suggestion in the air that Boro's messy goal on 22 minutes was going to prove enough to put the Teesiders through to the next round.

In a fascinating rather than exciting encounter, Manchester United scored the only goal in a tightly fought contest.

This was a game that had so much huff and puff in midfield - with little to show with regard to shots - that nil-nil looked written all over it. In fact, it was difficult to believe that the Hammers had lost it at the final whistle. It's not exactly that the home side were unlucky, more that they had nullified ManUre's attack to the point at which it looked as if both sides would be happy with the draw.

"Move along - nothing to see here"

West Ham fought out a goal-less draw at the Emirates, extending their unbeaten run and frustrating the Arse into the bargain.

It was pretty much defensive duties all afternoon and Arsenal had two reasonable chances that fell to Adebayor although Man of the Match James Collins also saw Clichy clear a header of the line just before half-time. Otherwise that's about it. I'm not going to waste my time writing about it and yours reading it except to say how gratifying it is to be able to see West Ham go into a game like this with a reasonable chance of getting a result. Well done to a defensive unit that is now looking rock solid thanks, presumably, to excellent coaching. Odd how things can turn around, isn't it?

The score doesn't tell the whole story here as a rampant Hammers tore Hull open so easily it could have run into double figures under the Upton Park floodlights.

As it was a first half-goal from Di Michele - who played superbly and deserved more - and a second half strike from Carlton Cole, were enough to cement West Ham's position in the top half of the table and give Hull a football lesson in the bargain.

There's no denying this was a comfortable win for West Ham against opponents who never managed to put the Hammers under any type of serious pressure.

Following the North-east side's win against Premier opponents Stoke in the last round it was obvious that ITV would show this as one of their weekend matches hoping, no doubt, for the type of upset long associated with West Ham or, at the very least, an 'up and 'at em'' performance from the home side.

Make no mistake this was an impressive win over a Fulham side that have been bang in form recently and who have had - prior to today at least - a good defensive record.

The Hammers went ahead early in the 7th minute when Di Michele - who was replacing the missing Bellamy - pounced on a poor attempted clearance from ex-Hammer John Pantsil; the defender having tried to turn a chested down ball back to his keeper.

Honours even at St James' Park and round at our house as Cockneys and Geordies - or at least two teams representing them - fought out an exciting draw.

Probably both sets of fans will point to individual instances in which a victory could have been snatched - both sides probably had valid penalty claims turned down, for example - but a draw was probably a fair result as want-away keeper Shay Given made a stunning save from Jack Collison while Newcastle had their chances too particularly in the closing stages.

Despite going behind to the inevitable Michael Owen goal - he really does love to score against the Hammers - West Ham struck back through Craig Bellamy before the break and went ahead when Carlton Cole sprung a poor offside trap to power the claret and blue ahead.

However, youngster Tony Carroll headed an equaliser after 78 minutes to ensure a share of the spoils although a superb late tackle by Matthew Upson denied Gutierrez with the last shot of the game.

This result keeps West Ham firmly in 10th place with Newcastle tucked in just behind them; strange then that the media - not happy unless West Ham are being slated in some way - described this as a relegation battle. On this showing, and providing the Bellamy and Parker rumours are shown to be just that, it's probably the Hammers who can look forward to a better second half of the season.

You know the score with these games. Win and it is just what everyone expects anyway, lose and you're a mug.

Against a side that made the semi-finals last season, West Ham might have expected to struggle given their problems with meeting lower league sides over the years. But, in truth, the Hammers strolled to victory here and the result was virtually assured by half time after Ilunga scored his first goal for the Hammers after 10 minutes and Mark Noble slotted home from the penalty spot after 39.

A desperately needed home win came late, but was deserved none the less, when a Carlton Cole shot deflected off of Diego Tristan to deceive the Stoke keeper. The MOTD highlights showed Cole shaking his head and beaming wildly and he must have been thinking what the rest of us were; when your luck is down you get nothing - see Aston Villa - when it's up you it a deflected winner with five minutes to go. Crazy game!

In fact, West Ham showed a good deal of fortitude in this match. They went behind early with just five minutes on the clock when Faye lost his marker James Collins and headed in from a Fuller corner.

A fine away win this, after Portsmouth squandered the chance to take a first half lead just before half-time when ex-Hammer Jermaine Defoe missed his spot kick - to the delight of the travelling faithful.

The Hammers, who dropped behind early in the eighth minute to a Behladi goal only to equalise through the increasingly impressive Jack Collinson, came good late on when Carlton Cole was on hand to tap in after seventy minutes with Craig Bellamy scoring twice impressively to wrap it up.

Five defeats at home before Christmas is relegation form. Two goals at home in six games is relegation form. But now - were we in any doubt - we've really hit the point that decides when the relegation dogfight has started; that is the dreaded 'play well but unluckily lose to a fluke goal' scenario. Heads down everyone - we're in a battle!

Those wonderful Soccernet statisticians tell me that West Ham had twenty shots on goal of which eight were on target, but sometimes it seemed much more as Bellamy terrorised the Villa defence and forced Brad Fieldel into several top notch saves.