In American football’s NFL, whenever a player faces his former team, pundits label it a ‘revenge game’. But, for mild-mannered West Ham United defender Maximilian Kilman, revenge will be the farthest thing from his mind when he faces his former team Wolverhampton Wanderers on Monday evening.
Kilman will always be grateful for the opportunity Wolves granted him when they signed him as an untested, virtually unknown 21-year-old from non-league Maidenhead United in August 2018. Over six seasons at Molineux, he developed into a Premier League regular before captaining Wolves in his final season at the club.
The 27-year-old swapped the West Midlands for East London in July this year. Three weeks later, he faced his former team in a pre-season match in Florida, but now he will come up against them for the first time in a competitive game.
With West Ham eager to show improvement defensively after conceding eight goals in defeats by Arsenal and Leicester City, and regain the form that saw the Irons win 2-0 at Newcastle United a fortnight ago, Kilman is focused only on his current Club, rather than thinking about his old one.
“Obviously it's been inconsistent,” he reflected. “You know, we've had a good performance in there, and obviously two performances where we know we should be doing much better, so that's probably been a reflection on the season. We've not had a run of good form, but we have shown glimpses of some really good performances, and we definitely need to improve as a team and make sure that we are more consistent.
“We've got a very good group of players. We're all together in this and we want to come out on the good side of it, so we're definitely working really hard and hopefully things will turn.
“This is a game I’ve been looking forward to as obviously I'd been [at Wolves] for such a long time, and they also gave me the opportunity to come to West Ham. So, of course I'm grateful for some good memories there but now, obviously, I'm with West Ham, I need to do my best for West Ham, and that's what I'm looking to do.”
Of course, Kilman is working with someone he also played under at Wolves in Julen Lopetegui, and the No26 is determined to perform to his best for a Head Coach he has plenty of respect for.
At the same time, for all the preparation Lopetegui will give his team, he knows he and his teammates are the only ones who can influence things on the pitch once the game kicks-off.
Kilman continued: “He has told us just to ‘give your best every single day’. We've got big games coming up, so make sure, you know we have, we give 100% as we always do and things will turn.
“We know the manager is under pressure but we’re also under a lot of pressure and we want to perform and we want to get good results. We’re West Ham and we need to be performing and getting good results because that’s the level the Club wants to be at. We need to get our heads down and make sure we do that because Monday is another big opportunity to get it right and hopefully, from there, we can push on.
“We've got a group of very experienced players and we've got a lot of leaders in the team, so I think everyone has had their say. In moments when things are going tough, you need everyone to stick together and show that leadership. We have a big group of players who can do that, so we just need to carry on improving as a team and hopefully, as I said, things will change.”
London Stadium will be filled to capacity with well over 60,000 supporters again on Monday evening, and Kilman knows just how passionate the Claret and Blue Army are for their team, and how desperate they are to enjoy the same sort of success they have enjoyed in recent seasons.
He added: “My message to the fans is just to stick with us, as we all want to give as much as we can, and we're trying our best and we're going to do everything we can to change this and for sure we will come out on the brighter side of it.
“All players were fans before as kids so we can all feel it and we all want to do well, and I think that’s the same message from the whole Football Club, that we want to get back to where we should be.”
