West Ham United manager Manuel Pellegrini has urged his team not to fear to play at London Stadium.
Since moving from Upton Park in 2016, the Hammers have found it hard at their new home and the boss feels the atmosphere should be encouraging.
“I don’t know why this stadium has to be difficult. I don’t see any reason why it has to be difficult. The pitch has the same measurements. The grass is in very good shape. The atmosphere with 55,000 people is great. The stadium is not an excuse,” Pellegrini said.
The former Manchester City manager further called on his charges to forget the struggles of last season and focus their attention on the new one and fight to register some positive results.
“When a season finishes it is finished. All the experiences, positive or negative, must finish at the end of the season. Now we have a new season. I don’t know why it can be a negative stadium, there is not any reason. Maybe they had problems last season in a game, maybe they changed from a stadium that was the club’s home for 100 years. But it’s a positive change, not a negative change.” he explained.
“The players are playing, you can just talk with them for 10 minutes during half-time but the rest of the game the players must decide. You cannot be shouting all the game, pressing them. During the week, the manager is 95% important, not on the day of the game. Three meters nearer or three meters back, it’s not a problem.” the boss concluded.
The club was founded in 1895 as Thames Ironworks and reformed in 1900 as West Ham United. They moved to the Boleyn Ground in 1904, which remained their home ground for more than a century. The team initially competed in the Southern League and Western League before joining the Football League in 1919. They were promoted to the top flight in 1923, when they were also losing finalists in the first FA Cup Final held at Wembley. In 1940, the club won the inaugural Football League War Cup.
West Ham have been winners of the FA Cup three times, in 1964, 1975, and 1980, and have also been runners-up twice, in 1923, and 2006. The club have reached two major European finals, winning the European Cup Winners’ Cup in 1965 and finishing runners-up in the same competition in 1976. West Ham also won the Intertoto Cup in 1999. They are one of eight clubs never to have fallen below the second tier of English football, spending 60 of 92 league seasons in the top flight, up to and including the 2017–18 season. The club’s highest league position to date came in 1985–86, when they achieved third place in the then First Division.
Three West Ham players were members of the 1966 World Cup final-winning England team: captain Bobby Moore and goalscorers Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters.