West Ham United have little option but to stick with Avram Grant as manager.

The Daily Express says West Ham's co-owners can no longer have been wondering what to do, but who to hire. Dispensing with Grant should be the easy part after a squalid defeat bereft of enthusiasm, let alone ambition, neatly encapsulated an abject campaign to date.

Targeting someone who would be willing to take over at a club marooned at the foot of the table and capable of preventing them spiralling towards oblivion is likely to prove rather more difficult.

Martin O'Neill? Out of work, though surely not out of his mind to take on such an onerous task. Alan Pardew? Available and apparently keen to return, but he could not arrest Charlton's decline in a similar position. Alan Curbishley? Not an appointment to unite disgruntled supporters given the acrimonious circumstances of how his previous reign ended.

It says much that Grant's tenure may run simply by default, a lack of replacements and a hefty contract keeping him in place.