WEST HAM 3 SOUTHAMPTON 0 TO KNEES-UP

unlikely to be enough to save them. In reality, there was no hiding place.

Not for the owners and decisionmakers. Not for Moyes. And certainly not for his players.

There couldn’t be any more excuses. This was the time to stand and deliver.

Effort

Even if the result hadn’t gone their way, those 50-odd thousand punters wanted to see the effort – to see that the players cared like they did.

They had their answer 45 minutes later. Three goals up, West Ham had answered all the questions. As awful as the Saints were, the Hammers ran about like it meant something. And in Marko Arnautovic they held the trump card.

Two of the players gestured to the crowd after the third goal, the pick of the afternoon, trying to raise them.

There really wasn’t any need – by this time they were onside – even though this might just last until the next home game.

Of course, the irritants which have opened wounds among the Hammers’ support are not going to be solved overnight.

The London Stadium isn’t the Boleyn. Champions League football, hinted at by the owners, as a possible consequence of the move, is far further away than Championship football.

They still aren’t out of the woods.

But they’ve taken a step in the right direction.

West Ham predicted a riot. It turned into a fiesta.

And in the boardroom at the London Stadium you can bet the great and the good of West Ham United heaved one mighty sigh of relief.

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