Green’s monumental performance lifts Hammers

WEST HAM are never slow in honouring their heroes. The bronze monument outside Upton Park bearing the statues of Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters is a fitting tribute to the club’s golden age, but another figure may soon have to be squeezed onto the plinth.

Robert Green’s performance in reducing Arsenal’s unbeaten home record to rubble on Saturday carried the whiff of legend. The north Londoners peppered their visitors’ goal, 27 times to be precise, but on each occasion Green was up to the challenge.

By the end, he was radiating that aura of invincibility which goalkeepers must wish they could bottle and carry from ground to ground.

The man himself was modesty personified. Green claimed not to remember a single save — “The game went so quickly,” he said with a smile — but the importance of every stop was writ large in the league table at 5pm. From dead men walking a month ago, West Ham are just two points adrift of safety and have free-falling Wigan and Sheffield United in their sights.

Green is an unlikely talisman. The 27-year-old had feared for his future earlier this season after a heated row with Alan Curbishley at the club’s training ground, a disagreement sparked by the manager’s decision to drop him in the wake of a humiliating 6-0 defeat at Reading.

But any lingering antipathy has melted away. Green was afforded a standing ovation by both sets of supporters at the end of his one-man show, while his reward from Curbishley was a manly hug and hair-ruffle.

“It has been a difficult time for Robert,” Curbishley said. “West Ham bought him injured and he had to wait to get in the side. When he did get in, the results didn’t go so well, but I think we’ll all come out of it stronger.”

Green’s saves ranged from the solid to the spectacular, but it was the sheer quantity which took the breath away. From the 55th second, when he parried Francesc Fabregas’ low shot with his torso, to the last moments of injury-time, when he plucked a corner from the head of Kolo Toure, he was simply unbeatable.

“That was like 40 training sessions in one for Robert,” Mark Noble, the midfielder, said. “He pulled off fantastic saves and the boys are buzzing for him because he works so hard and always stays behind after training. We were just looking on in amazement.”

West Ham’s delirious players and supporters celebrated as if survival was assured, but they must guard against complacency. Green will not always shine so brilliantly and his team will not always face such careless finishers.

Opta Fact: The Gunners have won only two of their last 10 matches in all competitions

Opta Fact: Bobby Zamora has scored in his last four Premiership matches.