Potter has not been fired yet, but there is a general feeling that if a deal can be reached with a replacement, a decision may be forthcoming. In the meantime, pundits aplenty have been discussing what West Ham might do, and TalkSPORT presenter Jeff Stelling highlighted the weak squad the Iron have when pointing towards an inevitable conclusion.

“He’s been dealt a bad hand in terms of options available,” he said. “If you looked at West Ham’s bench at the weekend, it was a shocker. Who does he put on if things are going wrong? When the fans turn, against Potter, whose substitutions were booed, that’s time up really, isn’t it?”

Pundit Ally McCoist added: “It’s extremely difficult to find a way back. It’s just about time up for any manager who loses the vast majority of the fan base. It’s near impossible to turn that around.”

Potter admitted after the Palace defeat: “It’s this level and at the moment it’s not enough and we have to face up to that. We have to do more, we have to work harder, we have to find a solution to it. We have to be more stable defensively and offensively and find more ways to look stronger as a team. That’s where the work is now.

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“We know we have to keep working. You have to face these moments up when it’s tough and it is tough at the moment. I said to the players, ‘we have to stick together, work hard, keep on working on finding the solution and come out of this tough period stronger for it’. That’s the aim now.”

Diouf backs Hammers to turn things around

Speaking after the game, West Ham’s summer signing El Hadji Malick Diouf provided a positive spin, believing the Iron can turn things around with the right level of work. “Of course we are frustrated, because we don’t have the result we want,” said the forward. “I think it’s very difficult right now, but we have to keep going and continue the hard work because I think it’s coming.

“We have to stay patient and stay together. The second half was much better. We scored the goal, but we don’t like to be down, so we’ll continue to work and continue to fight. Next week we have a difficult game away. We have to stay confident and ready for it – I think if we can follow this and be ready for the next game, we can change it. We need the fans, so we just ask them to come and support us. I think it’s the most important thing.”