1997–98 West Ham United F.C. season

West Ham United

1997–98 season
Chairman	Terry Brown
Manager	Harry Redknapp
Stadium	Boleyn Ground
Premiership	8th
FA Cup	Sixth round
League Cup	Quarter-finals
Top goalscorer	League: Hartson (15) All: Hartson (24)
Highest home attendance	25,909 (vs. Everton, 31 January)
Lowest home attendance	23,335 (vs. Crystal Palace, 3 December)
Average home league attendance	24,967
← 1996–97 1998–99 →

During the 1997–98 English football season, West Ham United F.C. competed in the FA Premier League (known as the FA Carling Premiership for sponsorship reasons).

Season summary

After last season's near miss with relegation, West Ham United looked more convincing than they had done for years during 1997-98. John Hartson matured into one of the best strikers in the Premiership, with his partner Paul Kitson also providing a steady supply of goals. Young centre-back Rio Ferdinand remained loyal to his employers despite endless speculation of a move to a bigger club. Things at Upton Park were looking better than they had done in a long time.

West Ham finished 8th in the final table - just one place short of UEFA Cup qualification. Holding on to Hartson and Ferdinand gave Harry Redknapp's men an even more enhanced chance of achieving that goal next time round.

Final league table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	Arsenal (C)	38	23	9	6	68	33	+35	78	1998–99 UEFA Champions League Group stage
2	Manchester United	38	23	8	7	73	26	+47	77	1998–99 UEFA Champions League Second qualifying round
3	Liverpool	38	18	11	9	68	42	+26	65	1998–99 UEFA Cup First round
4	Chelsea	38	20	3	15	71	43	+28	63	1998–99 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup First round ^1
5	Leeds United	38	17	8	13	57	46	+11	59	1998–99 UEFA Cup First round
6	Blackburn Rovers	38	16	10	12	57	52	+5	58
7	Aston Villa	38	17	6	15	49	48	+1	57
8	West Ham United	38	16	8	14	56	57	−1	56
9	Derby County	38	16	7	15	52	49	+3	55
10	Leicester City	38	13	14	11	51	41	+10	53
11	Coventry City	38	12	16	10	46	44	+2	52
12	Southampton	38	14	6	18	50	55	−5	48
13	Newcastle United	38	11	11	16	35	44	−9	44	1998–99 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup First round ^2
14	Tottenham Hotspur	38	11	11	16	44	56	−12	44
15	Wimbledon	38	10	14	14	34	46	−12	44
16	Sheffield Wednesday	38	12	8	18	52	67	−15	44
17	Everton	38	9	13	16	41	56	−15	40
18	Bolton Wanderers (R)	38	9	13	16	41	61	−20	40	Relegation to 1998–99 Football League First Division
19	Barnsley (R)	38	10	5	23	37	82	−45	35
20	Crystal Palace (R)	38	8	9	21	37	71	–34	33	1998 UEFA Intertoto Cup Third round ^3
										Relegation to the 1998–99 Football League First Division

Updated to games played on 10 May 1998.
Source: Premier League
Rules for classification: 1) points; 2) goal difference; 3) number of goals scored
¹ Chelsea qualified for the Cup Winners' Cup as defending champions and were the League Cup winners.
² As Arsenal qualified for the Champions League, their Cup Winners' Cup place as FA Cup winners defaulted to Newcastle United, the losing finalists.
³ Despite being relegated, Crystal Palace qualified for the 1998 Intertoto Cup.
(C) = Champion; (R) = Relegated; (P) = Promoted; (E) = Eliminated; (O) = Play-off winner; (A) = Advances to a further round.
Only applicable when the season is not finished:
(Q) = Qualified to the phase of tournament indicated; (TQ) = Qualified to tournament, but not yet to the particular phase indicated; (RQ) = Qualified to the relegation tournament indicated; (DQ) = Disqualified from tournament.

Results Summary

Overall								Home						Away
Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD
38	16	8	14	56	57	−1	56	13	4	2	40	18	+22	3	4	12	16	39	−23

Source: 1997-98 FA Premier League table

Results by round

Round	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	30	31	32	33	34	35	36	37	38
Ground	A	H	A	A	H	A	H	A	H	A	H	A	A	A	H	H	A	H	A	H	A	H	A	H	A	A	H	H	H	H	A	H	A	H	H	A	A	H
Result	W	W	L	D	W	L	L	L	W	L	W	L	L	L	W	W	L	W	L	W	W	W	L	D	W	D	D	D	W	W	L	D	D	W	L	L	D	W
Position	2	3	7	5	3	6	6	10	7	9	8	11	13	15	12	10	10	10	10	8	8	7	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	7	7	7	8	6	7	10	9	8

Source: 11v11.com: 1997-98 West Ham United results
Ground: A = Away; H = Home. Result: D = Draw; L = Loss; W = Win; P = Postponed.

Results

West Ham United's score comes first^[1]

Legend

Win

Draw

Loss

FA Premier League

Date	Opponent	Venue	Result	Attendance	Scorers
9 August 1997	Barnsley	A	2-1	18,667	Hartson, Lampard
13 August 1997	Tottenham Hotspur	H	2-1	25,354	Hartson, Berkovic
23 August 1997	Everton	A	1-2	34,356	Watson (own goal)
27 August 1997	Coventry City	A	1-1	18,289	Kitson
30 August 1997	Wimbledon	H	3-1	24,516	Hartson, Rieper, Berkovic
13 September 1997	Manchester United	A	1-2	55,068	Hartson
20 September 1997	Newcastle United	H	0-1	25,884
24 September 1997	Arsenal	A	0-4	38,012
27 September 1997	Liverpool	H	2-1	25,908	Hartson, Berkovic
4 October 1997	Southampton	A	0-3	15,212
18 October 1997	Bolton Wanderers	H	3-0	24,864	Berkovic, Hartson (2)
27 October 1997	Leicester City	A	1-2	20,201	Berkovic
9 November 1997	Chelsea	A	1-2	34,382	Hartson (pen)
23 November 1997	Leeds United	A	1-3	30,031	Lampard
29 November 1997	Aston Villa	H	2-1	24,976	Hartson (2)
3 December 1997	Crystal Palace	H	4-1	23,335	Hartson, Berkovic, Unsworth, Lomas
6 December 1997	Derby County	A	0-2	29,300
13 December 1997	Sheffield Wednesday	H	1-0	24,344	Kitson
20 December 1997	Blackburn Rovers	A	0-3	21,653
26 December 1997	Coventry City	H	1-0	24,532	Kitson
28 December 1997	Wimbledon	A	2-1	22,087	Kimble (own goal), Kitson
10 January 1998	Barnsley	H	6-0	23,714	Lampard, Abou (2), Moncur, Hartson, Lazaridis
17 January 1998	Tottenham Hotspur	A	0–1	30,284
31 January 1998	Everton	H	2-2	25,909	Sinclair (2)
7 February 1998	Newcastle United	A	1-0	36,736	Lazaridis
21 February 1998	Bolton Wanderers	A	1-1	25,000	Sinclair
2 March 1998	Arsenal	H	0-0	25,717
11 March 1998	Manchester United	H	1-1	25,892	Sinclair
14 March 1998	Chelsea	H	2-1	25,829	Sinclair, Unsworth
30 March 1998	Leeds United	H	3-0	24,107	Hartson, Abou, Pearce
4 April 1998	Aston Villa	A	0-2	39,372
11 April 1998	Derby County	H	0-0	25,155
13 April 1998	Sheffield Wednesday	A	1-1	28,036	Berkovic
18 April 1998	Blackburn Rovers	H	2-1	24,733	Hartson
25 April 1998	Southampton	H	2-4	25,878	Sinclair, Lomas
2 May 1998	Liverpool	A	0–5	44,414
5 May 1998	Crystal Palace	A	3-3	19,129	Ćurčić (own goal), Omoyinmi (2)
10 May 1998	Leicester City	H	4-3	25,781	Lampard, Abou (2), Sinclair

FA Cup

Round	Date	Opponent	Venue	Result	Attendance	Goalscorers
R3	3 January 1998	Emley	H	2–1	18,629	Lampard, Hartson
R4	24 January 1998	Manchester City	A	2-1	26,495	Berkovic, Lomas
R5	14 February 1998	Blackburn Rovers	H	2-2	25,729	Kitson, Berkovic
R5R	25 February 1998	Blackburn Rovers	A	1-1 (5-4 on pens)	21,972	Hartson
QF	8 March 1998	Arsenal	A	1-1	38,077	Pearce
QFR	17 March 1998	Arsenal	H	1-1 (lost 3-4 on pens)	25,859	Hartson

League Cup

Round	Date	Opponent	Venue	Result	Attendance	Goalscorers
R2 1st Leg	16 September 1997	Huddersfield Town	A	0-1	8,525
R2 2nd Leg	29 September 1997	Huddersfield Town	H	3-0 (won 3-1 on agg)	16,137	Hartson (3)
R3	15 October 1997	Aston Villa	H	3-0	20,360	Hartson (2), Lampard
R4	19 November 1997	Walsall	H	4-1	17,463	Lampard (3), Hartson
QF	6 January 1998	Arsenal	H	1-2	24,770	Abou

Squad

^[2] Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player 1 GK Luděk Mikloško 2 DF Tim Breacker 3 DF Julian Dicks 4 DF Steve Potts[3] 5 DF Richard Hall 6 DF David Unsworth 8 MF Trevor Sinclair 9 FW Paul Kitson 10 FW John Hartson 11 MF Steve Lomas[4] 13 GK Stephen Bywater 15 DF Rio Ferdinand 16 MF John Moncur 17 MF Stan Lazaridis 18 MF Frank Lampard 19 DF Ian Pearce

No. Position Player 20 DF Andrew Impey 21 GK Les Sealey 22 GK Craig Forrest 23 MF Scott Mean 24 FW Samassi Abou 25 MF Lee Hodges 26 DF Mohamed Berthé 27 FW Emmanuel Omoyinmi 28 DF Chris Coyne 29 MF Eyal Berkovic 30 DF Joey Keith 31 GK Neil Finn 32 GK Bernard Lama 33 FW Lee Boylan 34 FW Gary Alexander

Left club during season

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player 7 MF Ian Bishop (to Manchester City) 8 DF Marc Rieper (to Celtic) 12 DF Keith Rowland (to Queens Park Rangers) 13 DF David Terrier (to Newcastle United)

No. Position Player 14 FW Iain Dowie[5] (to Queens Park Rangers) 24 MF Michael Hughes (to Wimbledon) 30 FW Ian Moore (to Nottingham Forest) 30 FW Paulo Alves (to Sporting Lisbon)

Reserve squad

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player - MF Jimmy Bullard - MF Craig Etherington

No. Position Player - DF Anthony Henry - DF David Partridge

Transfers

In

Date	Pos	Name	From	Fee
2 June 1997	MF	Eyal Berkovic	Maccabi Haifa	£1,750,000
9 July 1997	DF	David Terrier	Metz	Free transfer
21 July 1997	GK	Craig Forrest	Ipswich Town	£500,000
15 August 1997	DF	David Unsworth	Everton	Swap
18 September 1997	DF	Ian Pearce	Blackburn Rovers	£2,300,000
26 September 1997	DF	Andrew Impey	QPR	£1,200,000
28 October 1997	FW	Samassi Abou	Cannes	£250,000
29 January 1998	MF	Trevor Sinclair	QPR	£2,300,000
20 February 1998	GK	Stephen Bywater	Rochdale	£300,000

Out

Date	Pos	Name	To	Fee
14 May 1997	DF	Slaven Bilić	Everton	£4,500,000
15 August 1997	MF	Danny Williamson	Everton	Swap
12 September 1997	DF	Marc Rieper	Celtic	£1,400,000
25 September 1997	MF	Michael Hughes	Wimbledon	£1,600,000
29 January 1998	DF	Keith Rowland	QPR	Swap
29 January 1998	MF	Iain Dowie	QPR	£1,600,000
26 March 1998	MF	Ian Bishop	Manchester City	Free transfer

Transfers in: £8,600,000

Transfers out: £7,500,000

Total spending: £1,100,000

Statistics

Starting 11

Considering starts in all competitions

Considering a 4-3-1-2 formation

• GK: #22, Craig Forrest, 20
• RB: #2, Tim Breacker, 24
• CB: #15, Rio Ferdinand, 46
• CB: #19, Ian Pearce, 39
• LB: #6, David Unsworth, 41
• CM: #18, Frank Lampard, 38
• CM: #11, Steve Lomas, 42
• CM: #17, Stan Lazaridis, 34
• AM: #29, Eyal Berkovic, 45
• CF: #10, John Hartson, 42
• CF: #24, Samassi Abou, 16

References

1. http://www.statto.com/football/teams/west-ham-united/1997-1998/results
2. http://www.footballsquads.co.uk/eng/1997-1998/faprem/westham.htm
3. Potts was born in Hartford, Connecticut, the United States.
4. Lomas was born in Hanover, Germany, but also qualified to represent Northern Ireland internationally and made his international debut for Northern Ireland in 1994.
5. Dowie was born in Hatfield, England, but also qualified to represent Northern Ireland internationally through his father and made his international debut for Northern Ireland in 1990.