David Moyes
West Ham are set to be without five senior defenders for the trip to Burnley and David Moyes is considering using Declan Rice at centre-back as a result. Rice ended the match last weekend against Chelsea in the right-centre back role alongside Issa Diop and Craig Dawson and may have to repeat that role on Sunday afternoon. A lot depends on the fitness of Cresswell, who is a more than capable centre-back but the defender is a doubt going into the weekend’s action, according to Moyes
David Moyes said: “Cress is doing much better, it will be touch and go if he makes it or not. We’ve seen him out and about a little bit and he’s doing a bit more, feeling a bit more mobile than he has been. It would be important if we could get him back, it would help us a lot. We’ll give him every opportunity to try and make it.”
The importance of Cresswell to the team is linked to Moyes’ reluctance to use Arthur Masuaku in a back-four with the manager preferring to play the DR Congo international as a wing-back. If Cresswell is out of the Burnley match, Masuaku is the obvious replacement with Fredericks and Johnson out but his inclusion requires Moyes to select three centre-backs and with no Zouma or Ogbonna to call upon the manager will be forced into moving Rice into the defence.
David Moyes said: “Declan is certainly a consideration for that and he can play there as well. He would give us a lot of pluses if we play him at the back, we’d build better. I think we did it last year at Tottenham and we missed him in midfield so wherever Declan plays he’s really important.”
Rice will no doubt be happy to do whatever the team needs of him during this trying time, even if it is not in the position he believes suits him best.
Declan Rice said: “You can see in my game I’m never a centre-back. I feel like I’ve got too much ability to be playing at the back. I want to be progressive and athletic. I feel like I can do that in a midfield sense. I feel like now I’m not just a holding midfielder anymore. I was always labelled as one that just sits in front of the back four, I really now want to see myself as a box-to-box player where I can get up and down and start creating things as well as getting back and helping the team as well. There is still a long way to go and I can improve so much.”
