The Times West Ham Special

In today's excellent Times West Ham special the paper reveals some more interesting inside stories from Upton Park.

Club doctor Ges Steinbergs was hauled away from the West Ham dugout by security men at Upton Park during West Ham's game against Manchester United in 1996. West Ham United had just equalised and Steinbergs "gleefully hammered at the dugout and stuck two fingers up at Alex Ferguson." Steinbergs claims he was just relaying the 2-2 score to the Manure manager.

Suffering concussion, Ian Pearce, the defender, was lying in the bath at Maine Road when 16 players came in for a shower. “He didn’t recognise one of them and had a panic attack,” Steinbergs said. “When I told Harry Redknapp that Ian didn’t know who he was, he said: ‘Tell him he is Bobby Moore and get him playing next week’.”

The players are forced to wear tights to assist muscular recovery after matches. “We had all the usual ‘oh, you look nice in yours’ at first, but not one of the boys protested,” Niall Clark says. “Some keep them on in bed at night, but I don’t know what their wives think about it. And, no, they don’t have to wear high heels and suspenders as well.”