Anderson hits Saints on break to halt Hasenhuttl revival

FELIPE ANDERSON’S six-minute brace sunk Southampton 2-1 and dragged West Ham into the Premier League’s top 10.

The Brazil playmaker’s quickfire double cancelled out Nathan Redmond’s scrambled goalmouth finish as the Hammers battled hard for victory at St Mary’s.

If Anderson’s angled drive for his first looked tidy, his imperious match-winning finish to cap a two-pass counter-attack blitz proved very easy on the eye.

The accomplished 25-year-old now has eight goals and two assists for the Premier League season: amid the post-Christmas malaise his was a performance of unrivalled poise and precision.

Ralph Hasenhuttl tasted defeat for the first time as Southampton manager, his manful Saints unable to string together three league wins.

West Ham boss Manuel Pellegrini will have been delighted to tiptoe home with all three points, especially given his injury-hit squad was so threadbare he could only fill six of the seven substitute berths.

West Ham’s Declan Rice revealed Pellegrini had told them to keep working and they would get their reward in the second half.

He said: “You could see in the first half we were getting chances and we were getting the ball out wide. The manager said ‘keep going and we would get a chance’.

“That’s the first half of the season out of the way and we’re setting ourselves up for the second half of the season.”

West Ham’s Aaron Cresswell praised Anderson who continued his rich scoring run.

Cresswell said: “Felipe’s two goals were unbelievable and we got the three points.

“He has been fantastic. He’s our top goalscorer and he’s our in-form man.”

Austrian boss Hasenhuttl has forced an immediate upturn in attitude having replaced the ineffectual Mark Hughes, with two victories from two including a crucial one at relegation rivals Huddersfield Town.

But not even that new backbone was enough to help salvage a point.

Redmond admitted Southampton were left with work to do after the defeat.

He said: “We’ve still got work to do.

“You can’t give that sort of quality time on the ball.

“We have to look at the negatives from this game and work on them.

“We can only go back and look at the positives and the negatives. We need to look at the fundamentals which we need to learn from going forward.”