HE’S A LUCKY YARM
Supersub is hero for Hammers
SUPERSUB Andriy Yarmolenko’s last-minute winner took West Ham a giant step towards Premier League salvation.
Manager David Moyes celebrated animatedly on the touchline as Yarmolenko’s low finish sealed a home-and-away double against Chelsea for the Hammers and dented the Champions League hopes of Frank Lampard’s side. In an infuriating passage for Moyes before the break, the home side had a Tomas Soucek goal wiped out by VAR official Jon Moss.
ANDRIY YARMOLENKO caused a late upset to destroy Chelsea’s perfect postlockdown record and take West Ham three giant steps closer to safety.
His breakaway goal in the 90th minute was greeted by surprisingly loud cheers in the near-empty London Stadium as staff and players celebrated.
Chelsea seemed to have ridden their luck and a couple of rash West Ham challenges just to claim a point.
Willian’s double – one from the spot and one from a setpiece 25 yards from goal – was devastating punishment for two defensive lapses by the home side.
But a lacklustre display by Chelsea’s defence cost them on a night when a sixth win on the bounce could have lifted them to third.
It could have been even worse for Frank Lampard, right, in what looked such a harmless trip across the capital.
West Ham last scored 123 days ago – in the right end at least – and they were unlucky not to end that duck even earlier in the game.
Tomas Soucek, who put past his own goalkeeper against
Tottenham last week, thought he had given the Hammers a surprise lead from a corner in the 34th minute.
Cesar Azpilicueta seemed to beat him to Issa Diop’s flick, the ball hit Michail Antonio on the ground and Soucek forced in the rebound.
VAR’s magic eye took three minutes to decide first that Antonio was offside and second that he was interfering with Kepa Arrizabalaga’s line of sight enough on Soucek’s follow-up to justify wiping off the goal. The disbelief was still stuck in the throats of David Moyes
and the West Ham staff when Christian Pulisic went up the other end and drew a clever penalty out of Diop which VAR did agree with.
When Willian did the business from the spot there was a temptation to think of it as game over. But Lampard’s team had not been playing particularly well all night.
A couple of on-target shots were dealt with comfortably enough by Lukasz Fabianski and when Tammy Abraham had intuitively let the ball run in the 20th minute, Pulisic should have done better than curling his shot over the bar.
Antonio Rudiger, though, summed up the night Chelsea were having when in first-half injury-time he needlessly sliced the ball over his own line for a corner.
This time to avoid any VAR meddling West Ham cut out the middle man completely, Jarrod Bowen picking out Soucek whose downward header evaded Abraham’s best efforts on the line.
Chelsea’s appalling defending continued into the second half when Antonio had a shout for a penalty against Rudiger waved away only for the visitors to stand still while Antonio picked himself up and converted Bowen’s low cross back into the area.
Lampard rang the changes as the away side continued to push for a way back, but their own attempts to bundle the ball in did nothing more than send the ball pinballing around the West Ham area.
Moyes was drawing on all the experience he had to get West Ham over the line, even sending on Jack Wilshere for his first appearance since October.
But a rash challenge by his skipper Declan Rice on Pulisic handed Chelsea a partial escape – Willian levelling with a classy free-kick.
But when Yarmolenko took his time to pick his spot, nobody could argue it was any less than West Ham deserved.