West ham assistant boss Steve Clarke has defended underfire Gianfranco Zola after claiming people should blame him for the club’s plight.

After finishing a respectable ninth last season, the Hammers have struggled this term and are currently second bottom in the Premier League.

The Upton Park club’s woes deepened on Tuesday night after they slumped to a 3-1 defeat

Angered: Clarke was unhappy with the officials in the defeat at Birmingham

But bizarrely Clarke says he is to blame for West Ham’s troubles.

He said: ‘If there are any faults, if anyone’s looking to blame, they’ll have to blame me.


‘I’m the guy they brought in to help Gianfranco. He’s the novice manager, just in the game but if anyone wants to point fingers, point them at me.

‘It’s been another disappointing night for us. It’s been a difficult time recently and tonight sort of summed it up.’

Alessandro Diamanti equalised Chung-Yong Lee’s opener before the match turned in the 77th minute when Green spilled Gary Cahill’s shot in front of Ivan Klasnic, who snapped up the gift to score from point-blank range.

But despite Green’s clanger, Clarke backed him and the Hammers to bounce back in Sunday’s visit of Chelsea.

‘It’s a great game for us. Nobody expects us to get anything and they have to go there and work as hard as they can,’ said the 46-year-old.

‘Football’s all about mistakes and Robert will deal with it and he will recover. The best thing he can do is to go out against Chelsea and have the game of his life.

‘He has to respond and I’m sure he will.’

Clarke also denied that the boardroom wranglings at Upton Park is affecting the team.

West Ham are set to turn down a £46million takeover bid from David Gold and David Sullivan but unless the club get new investment then Zola will have to sell before he can strengthen the squad next month.

‘Obviously we’re aware it’s going on but there’s nothing we can do about it,’ said Clarke.

‘Inside the dressing room it’s not spoken about.’