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EPL It was during a team meeting on Saturday morning that West Ham United’s squad suspected something was different. Training at the club’s main hub, Rush Green, was scheduled to start at 9. 30am and head coach Graham Potter arrived early to prepare for Monday’s match away to Everton. But that session with his squad was disrupted by the 50-year-old wandering in and out of the room. It was not common for him to behave in this manner, which confused the players. Advertisement It turned out Potter, who only succeeded summer 2024 appointment Julen Lopetegui in January, had been told he too had been relieved of his duties. The former Brighton and Chelsea manager then informed the players and said his farewells, with many of the squad shocked at the timing of the decision. Club secretary Andrew Pincher tried to ease their concerns by reassuring them someone new would be overseeing training at 12. 30pm. The players were initially unaware that person would be Nuno Espirito Santo. Former West Ham manager Slaven Bilic held conversations with the board over a return, but Nuno was their preferred option. They first entertained the possibility of the Portuguese replacing Potter earlier this month, when he was sacked as Nottingham Forest head coach. West Ham officially announced Potter’s dismissal at 10. 35am and confirmed Nuno, who has signed a three-year contract, as his successor four hours later. The 51-year-old will be assisted initially by academy coaches Mark Robson, Steve Potts, Gerard Prenderville and Billy Lepine, with a further announcement on his coaching staff expected in due course. “I am very pleased to be here and very proud to be representing West Ham United, ” Nuno told the club’s website. “The work has already started and I am looking forward to the challenge that is ahead. ” Potter won only six of his 25 games during his eight months at West Ham, including two (against Fulham on January 14 and Leicester City on February 27) of his 12 home matches. Supporters turned on him during the 2-1 defeat by visitors Crystal Palace last Saturday with chants of, “You don’t know what you’re doing”, and, “You’re getting sacked in the morning”. But, despite being under pressure, he did not expect his week to end like this. He oversaw training on Monday, gave the squad Thursday off with the Everton match not until Monday and conducted his usual media duties on Friday. At that pre-match press conference, Potter spoke about his appreciation of the board, the need to fix West Ham’s problems together and the rather peculiar viral face-swap trend that involves him. Advertisement But as he acknowledged in a statement released after his departure, “the results have just not been good enough up to now”, and he leaves with West Ham 19th in the 20-team Premier League. The Athletic has talked to people at the club close to the hierarchy and to players, and people close to the outgoing head coach. Everyone spoke under the condition of anonymity, to protect relationships. We can reveal for the first time what went wrong for Potter at West Ham, including how: Before Potter signed a two-and-a-half-year contract to manage West Ham in January, a picture leaked online of him meeting their then technical director Tim Steidten in the foyer of a hotel. This annoyed Potter, who felt holding talks in such a public place was an amateurish move. But despite his frustration, he felt it was the right time to return to the touchline, 20 months after being sacked by Chelsea in April 2023. “As soon as I spoke to this club, it felt right for me, ” Potter said in his first West Ham press conference. “I spoke to the board and everyone connected with the club. This one felt like the right one. I’m really excited to be here with a passionate and brilliant fanbase. I think it’s a good fit. ” Potter learnt Spanish and sought advice from former England manager Roy Hodgson and current England rugby union head coach Steve Borthwick during his time away from the game. He was also heavily linked with the England job before Thomas Tuchel’s appointment late last year, so his arrival at the London Stadium was considered a coup. But it was a relationship that was strained from the start, given protracted negotiations over the length of his contract. Majority shareholder David Sullivan was initially only willing to give Potter a deal until the end of last season, terms he was reluctant to accept. Karren Brady, the vice-chair, then led negotiations, and all parties agreed to Potter’s terms. Advertisement In his first week, he called a team meeting at the training ground and was happy with the players’ response about where improvement was needed. But he then got off to a rocky start on the pitch, losing 2-1 away to Aston Villa in the FA Cup in his first game in charge. Despite an encouraging performance that night, striker Niclas Fullkrug and winger Crysencio Summerville suffered hamstring injuries that would keep them out for three and seven months respectively. West Ham won only one of their next five games. After the 1-0 home loss to Brentford on February 15, a team meeting was held. The players were aware that performance was not up to Potter’s standards. An honest discussion ensued, which yielded a positive display away to Arsenal a week later. Bowen’s solitary goal secured the win on what will be remembered as just about the only day in the Potter era where it clicked. His 5-3-2 formation worked, and the team spirit was palpable after full time: Potter embraced his backroom staff, Alvarez mischievously celebrated in front of the Arsenal fans seated behind the dugouts and Todibo hopped on fellow defender Aaron Wan-Bissaka’s back. Bowen led the walk to the away enclosure, where supporters serenaded the squad with various chants. Back in the dressing room, Potter told the players they had the next day off. It was not “Champagne football”, as he admitted in his post-match press conference, but it was a step in the right direction. Hours later, Potter was pictured travelling on the London Underground. He had a funny exchange with an Arsenal supporter, who was not best pleased to see him. But for the coach, it felt like a match where he was rewarded for his efforts on the training ground. A 2-0 home victory over Leicester a few days later meant West Ham had kept consecutive clean sheets for the first time since the November (when they drew 0-0 with Everton at home and won 2-0 away to Newcastle United under Lopetegui), and had their first back-to-back league wins since previous March, when David Moyes was still the manager. The positive run, though, was not to last. By the May 11 visit to Manchester United, West Ham were winless in eight games. Advertisement Potter made three changes to the starting XI, with Coufal and midfielders Guido Rodriguez and James Ward-Prowse brought in to replace Emerson Palmieri, Lucas Paqueta and Fullkrug. Kyle Macaulay, the head of recruitment, emailed the team sheet to Sullivan, who was not pleased with the line-up. Potter was informed failing to win that day could cost him his job, but West Ham ended up leaving Old Trafford with a 2-0 victory, courtesy of goals from Bowen and Tomas Soucek. Despite the team’s underwhelming performances, Potter remained confident he was the right man for the job. He thought his squad were responding well to feedback from him and his backroom staff. In April, Potter spoke about the benefits of sharing “home truths” with the players. “You have to look people in the eye and speak honestly, ” he said at a press conference. “They help clear the air and give people a chance to voice their frustrations. That’s something we do all the time. It helps us understand and look under the bonnet to see things clearer. ” One of Potter’s first acts at West Ham was to increase the intensity in training sessions and then give players time off. Under Lopetegui, some of the squad found it hard to understand what the Spaniard was trying to achieve, with the team often playing a possession-based game in training that had the goalkeepers sometimes mixing in with their outfield colleagues. But Potter was very much hands-on, although he delegated most of the work to assistants Billy Reid, Bruno Saltor, Narcis Pelach and Prenderville, who was promoted from the club’s under-21s setup earlier this month. Reid, Saltor and goalkeeper coaches Casper Ankergren and Linus Kandolin have all left the club with Potter. Many of the players enjoyed how meticulous the head coach was when going over details pre-and post-match but, as poor results continued, some felt this information went in one ear and out the other. Potter inherited a tempestuous group when he followed the shortest-lived managerial appointment in the club’s 130-year history, with Lopetegui sacked after just 22 games. The new boss did not want history to repeat itself, although there were further dressing-room incidents. Advertisement He also had concerns about the lack of leaders in the team, and appointed James Bell as a sports psychologist to help his squad better manage stressful situations. A common theme this season has been how quiet the dressing-room was after matches. Even following heavy losses to London rivals Chelsea and Tottenham, none of the senior players were vocal. Instead, it was Potter who did most of the talking. There were also questions over Bowen’s inability to lead the team. Although he is considered the club’s best player, he is not perhaps naturally suited to the captaincy and had a heated exchange with a West Ham supporter following last month’s Carabao Cup loss at Wolves. In April, Potter took issue with Fullkrug launching a diatribe against his team-mates after a 1-1 draw at home to already-relegated Southampton. The 32-year-old Germany international told Sky Sports of his “anger” at the display, saying “we didn’t have the ability or the motivation to push up”, and adding: “The motivation… sorry, we were s**t. I’m very angry. ” Although Fullkrug didn’t get fined over the episode, Potter was not pleased with the comments, which further cemented his view of a player who is one of West Ham’s highest earners. To compound matters, Potter had a disagreement with Alvarez that same month and felt a summer departure for the midfielder would be best for all parties. In August, Mexico captain Alvarez joined Turkish club Fenerbahce on loan in a deal including an option to make the move permanent at the end of the season. Todibo is another who did not have the greatest relationship with Potter. Having initially joined on loan from Nice in the summer of 2024, West Ham activated a £32. 8million ($43. 9m at the current rate) obligation to buy in June. Todibo, who has two caps for France, rejected a move to Juventus in favour of West Ham. Countryman Alphonse Areola also advised the defender to turn down the Italian side and join him at the London Stadium. But Todibo frustrated Potter with his inconsistent performances and was dropped for the 3-0 defeat by Tottenham two weeks ago over bad timekeeping. He did not produce a performance in training that was up to Potter’s standards on September 11 and was called to the head coach’s office and told to improve. But then he arrived late the following day. Advertisement Full-back Emerson lost his place in the latter stages of last season. The 31-year-old wanted to stay to fight for a recall, but Potter had other ideas. The left-back was not properly fit when he reported for pre-season and arrived late for training on a few occasions. Potter told the Italy international to train with the under-21s, and he was omitted from West Ham’s pre-season tour to the United States so he could find a new club. Eventually, on deadline day at the start of this month, Emerson joined Marseille for a small fee, becoming West Ham’s tenth departure in a summer that began with Mohammed Kudus being sold to Spurs for £55million. Antonio, the club’s record Premier League goalscorer, Cresswell and Coufal all departed in May upon the expiry of their contracts. The trio were popular members of the dressing room. Antonio, for example, was in charge of the squad’s fines system, would keep his fellow players in check and organised team-bonding sessions. Nobody has really replaced him as that figure. There is some sympathy for Potter among the players that this situation is not all his fault. He tried his best to unite the squad, but his decisions to get rid of some big characters counted against him. El Hadji Malick Diouf (Slavia Prague), Soungoutou Magassa (Monaco), Mateus Fernandes (Southampton) and Mads Hermansen (Leicester) came in over the summer, with Igor Julio joining on a season-long loan from Brighton, and Kyle Walker-Peters and Callum Wilson signing as free agents. West Ham spent around £125million altogether and, in pre-season, there was excitement from within over what they could achieve in their 2025-26 campaign. The atmosphere at the training ground, according to staff who work there, felt more together, more holistic. But the feel-good factor evaporated following a chastening 3-0 opening-weekend loss away to promoted Sunderland. Further defeats by Chelsea, Wolves, Tottenham and Crystal Palace added to Potter’s woes. Tara Warren, West Ham’s executive director, never usually attends their managers’ press conferences but was present when Potter addressed the media last Thursday, September 18, before the Palace game, and he faced reporters on Friday, the day before his dismissal, too. In a statement released by the League Managers Association later on Saturday, Potter said he was “incredibly disappointed” to be leaving West Ham, “particularly without being able to achieve what we set out to achieve at the start of our journey in east London”. Over to you, Nuno! (Top photo: Kevin Hodgson/MI News/Nur Photo via Getty Images) Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle Roshane Thomas is a staff writer who covers West Ham United for The Athletic. Previously, he worked for the Sunday Times and talk SPORT. Follow Roshane on Twitter @Roshane Sport