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Well, we all needed that, didn’t we? A victory in the Carabao Cup that gives us all hope that things can only get better. And how Nuno Espirito Santo needed the 4-1 win at Southampton more than most. David Sullivan was initially rumoured to have turned up at St. Mary’s, he may be wanting to have a say in who was to replace the West Ham boss, maybe just to underline that he hadn’t gone away, more's the pity.After such an insipid start to life outside the Premier League spotlight, defeat in this second round tie would've sharpened the knives for Nuno and thrust our fan base even further into despair. This was not how it was supposed to be. But the kids who have been around this club now for more than a few years searching for their chance to shine, to take the chances when it came their way, a Youth Cup winning side that was beginning to have its doubters, came up with the goods big time. It would be daft to think the whole ship was now back on track, that Nuno will probably return to type at Watford on Saturday and one uplifting night on the south coast was enough destroy all that doom and gloom. But the shafts of light were too obvious. Four young men stole the show: Lewis Orford has shown in a matter of weeks that he is the real deal. He dominated midfield, recorded 90 per cent pass accuracy, six chances created, seven recoveries and six passes into the final third. Here is a young man with real potential. Plenty have been saying this for a while, that he was over-hyped, the nearly kid who once impressed Thomas Tuchel in an impromptu England training session, but didn’t have the strength to hack it at the top level. I think we all know different now. Alongside him, on-loan Divine Mukasa - once of these parts, when he was rated the best midfielder in his age group before being poached by Manchester City - is back home on loan and really looking the part. The academy kid who was playing for the under 18s as a 14 year-old just oozes class and that flowing movement through midfield was too much for Southampton to cope with. Airidas Golambeckis, a scrawny lad who looks too frail to play centre back at this level, grew into the game, his confidence bursting through. It’s hard for a teenager to handle being a central defender at this level, but the boy from East Ham looked determined to prove any doubters wrong. And then we had Josh Ajala. Two fine goals, one a header the second with perfect first touch, on the run and shot into the far corner, will give Nuno something to think about now. I’ve been banging on about this kid’s natural goal scoring ability for some while. Again he looks frail, but he has pace and control and could be the find of our season. You can bet that Nuno will bring back the front line troops at Watford, but frankly he’d be mad not to start with Orford and Makasa in midfield after this display. We’ll see. Jarrod Bowen and Taty Castellanos weighed in with trademark finishes after the break on a night our travelling fans will long remember. Now the hard part is to turn all this into an acceptable performance at Watford as nothing else will do. The transfer window has a week left to run and we are slowly getting the poison out of our squad - those players who have, allegedly, refused to train properly or play for the club. It’s been a cloud over us all season and it’s going to be a difficult few days, five in five out would seem the minimum. But at least Nuno knows the kids are waiting. Of course the on-field issues, transfers, manager’s future and the general nonsense of the first weeks of the season, are overshadowed by the greed and power battle in the boardroom. I think we have all made our minds up by now of co-chair Vanessa Gold’s tactics in trying to extract the last penny for her 25 per cent shares in the club. We may well have also reached a conclusion on any debate about the character and motives of majority shareholder Sullivan, now seemingly having quite a hold over the club one way or another. Then, of course, we have Amanda Staveley with her nose pressed firmly against the boardroom window, having thrown a giant spanner in the works trying to buy any shares lying around, which has totally screwed our transfer window and temporarily blocked Daniel Kretinsky’s desires to take control and then inject £100m into the club. And what is co-chair Kretinsky’s opinion on all this? Well, your guess is as good as mine because the Czech multi-billionaire is largely silent on almost everything - from the Post Office to Sainsbury’s - and other stressed companies in between. But he’s clearly not pleased by Vanessa’s change of heart over an agreed deal to sell some of her shares to her fellow director at the last minute, it seems a day or so shy of the end of the pre-emption date for that deal. We were all told these shenanigans would not affect the smooth running of the club, the buying and selling of players and plans for an immediate return to the Premier League. Well it has had an impact and the participants of this scramble for every falling pound have shown not the slightest concern about anything but cash and power. The club seems frozen, total inertia. I wonder if Vanessa or Amanda thought of, or cared one jot, of the damage their actions would cause? You and me would be more than happy with the close-to £100m of Kretinsky’s offer for Gold’s shares. But it would now be maybe £140m. Grab it while you can, who cares about Kretinsky’s well published plans for our future. Don’t let the sight of even more folding money get in the way of the deals and cash Nuno needed to reboot our squad and make promotion a serious objective, rather than what we have witnessed from our opening two Championship games where the likes of Burnley, and in particular the grafters of Charlton, have given us a severe kick in the cobblers. Welcome to the underworld beneath the Premier League. Now we are one week away from the end of the pre-emption date for Gold’s decision to sell to Staveley. 2 September. One day after the transfer window shuts. You are paying attention, ladies? This is all on you. It took a while to sink in. KUMB/me have gently reminded folk that Vanessa’s actions have seriously damaged this window. But others have now also turned on her. Just look at our finances. There’s no Kretinsky money, we are having to sell to buy - loans out with possible options next summer are just kicking the can down the road, Nuno needs money now. Even the sales of Malick Diouf, Soungoutou Magassa and Edson Alvarez could well go towards shoring us up against future debts, or unpaid fees to other clubs. Whatever Kretinsky’s plans were, and there is no chance he will inject £100m into a club controlled by Sullivan and Gold, and whatever the spiel was that convinced Bowen to stay and sign a new contract, it’s all been blown out of the water now. Or at least shoved back into dry dock for a later date. January, maybe. But even now, next week isn’t the final part of this shares shuffle. It’s the end of the first sale. Will Kretinsky buy his entitlement? You really can’t see Sullivan buying anymore, it could take him over 50 per cent and the fit and proper test has been beefed up these past few years. If Kretinsky is the only buyer, he is the only one allowed to buy more shares in the second sale. He could, with Jakub Havrlant’s help, get to 49 per cent with his fellow Czech’s two per cent giving him control. Then the only way Staveley can enter the fray is to buy Sullivan’s shares. But that’s another 60 days pre-emptive rights, which take us into October. What happens now is anyone’s guess, but it certainly won’t be smooth waters for a few more weeks. Will our form improve, will Nuno still be in a job, what will our savaged squad look like by then? Will Sullivan still be sitting in his directors’ box perch with the delightful Ampika Pickston at his side? That, of course, was the major talking point after the Charlton defeat, apart from that ludicrous decision to let Castellanos take a comedy penalty when Bowen should have been on the job. Many fans renewed their season tickets on the strength of Sullivan stepping away from the board and the revelation that for three years he had been under a safeguarding order to keep away from the women’s and youth academy. So why, with our landlords at the London Stadium asking him not to attend matches, was he allowed to sit on that elevated ‘thrown’ of his? The first game of the season, the League Cup tie with Portsmouth, saw him sitting away from the posh seats with what looked like a minder mate. Saturday was very different. It seemed brazen defiance or just bloody mindedness to show he was still ‘boss’ with his 38 per cent shares, but no seat on either of the club’s boards. The Independent Football Regulator is still investigating the allegations about his private life, and they it seems have been in touch with the police. My only guess is that the safeguarding order, between the FA, local councils and the club - Karren Brady at the time - only referred to the complaint against him that ended recently in the High Court with his anonymity being lifted. It was, it seems, a voluntary decision. At the time there could have been four London councils involved. Newham in control of Stratford and the likes of Barking and Dagenham, Havering and Redbridge with regard to the training grounds at Rush Green and Chadwell Heath. Or maybe I’m over thinking this. Nobody, it seems, not the FA or Newham, is prepared to instruct him not to attend. Or do they not have that authority, or has the ban now lapsed? Whatever, the sight of him sitting there, feet up, watching the game, infuriated many who feel they have been conned into buying their season tickets again. If you look at West Ham from the outside, you see discourse, anger and frustration in every direction. A club seemingly at war with itself, from Sullivan to the board room, to the training grounds to the pitch, there seems to be issues. If this was a Premier League club I find it hard to see that the MSM and TV would be all over us every day, a soap opera to rival anything Eastenders could throw up. Oh for a quiet life, with a winning team and a club at peace with itself. Maybe the win at Southampton is a start. * Like to share your thoughts on this article? Please visit the KUMB Forum to leave a comment. * Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the highlighted author/s and do not necessarily represent or reflect the official policy or position of KUMB.com.