Paul Merson slammed Michail Antonio for his “bad, bad” miss in the 1-1 draw between West Ham and Tottenham.
Antonio squandered a glorious opening with the scores level after an hour of Tuesday’s (2 April) contest at London Stadium.
The United attacker was played through but, after initially doing well to time his run, he failed to pick his spot and instead fired straight at Guglielmo Vicario.
“Antonio is one-on-one with the goalkeeper,” Merson said on sky sport news [2 April, 9:34pm]. “[Micky] van de Ven gets back and you think he’s done the job, but he falls over.
“Antonio is one-on-one and it’s just a bad, bad finish. He hits it right at [Vicario]. The goalkeeper guesses like he would in the school playground – he lies down and it’s hit straight at him.”
The Jamaica international was a lot more involved after the restart, though, with a couple of chances going begging.
This opportunity in particular was a big one, however, and it is one he really should have been converting to put West Ham ahead in the game.
Antonio had scored in back-to-back games prior to this one, so he is by no means out of form.
Going further back, however, he has just those two goals in 20 appearances in all competitions, which it goes without saying is not a great return.
Not that this is new information, but West Ham could do with bringing in a prolific centre-forward in the summer. Manage that, and there will not be many stronger attacks anywhere in the country.
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