BLADES VAR HAPPIER THAN HAMMERS

Sheffield United 1 West Ham 0

WEST HAM suffered double agony after their injury-time equaliser was ruled out by VAR and they lost to another goalkeeping error.

Robert Snodgrass looked to levelled but his goal was ruled out for a handball by Declan Rice in the build-up.

Earlier Oli McBurnie took advantage when Hammers keeper David Martin misplaced a pass.

DAVID MOYES suffered his first defeat as West Ham boss thanks to a controversial VAR call in stoppage time and a goalkeeping error.

Moyes and his side thought they had equalised in the dying seconds when Robert Snodgrass scored from Declan Rice’s pass.

But VAR disallowed Snodgrass’ effort for handball against Rice to the anger of the Hammers and the delight of Sheffield United.

That huge disappointment summed up a miserable night for Moyes, whose men did not really deserve anything for a poor display.

Their goalkeeping problems also came back as Lukas Fabianski went off with a suspected recurrence of his hip injury early on and replacement David Martin blundered to hand the Blades victory. Sheffield celebrated Chris Wilder’s new contract by earning a welcome win to end their two-match losing run.

Just when Moyes thought everything was going well on his West Ham return, he was struck by the club’s goalkeeping jinx, which proved disastrous for Manuel Pellegrini.

Fabianski was only playing his fourth game since returning after three months out following surgery.

And he pulled up after taking a goal kick, in a similar situation to when he was first injured against Bournemouth in September.

He immediately signalled to the away dug-out and went off after 15 minutes to be replaced by Martin (right).

The Polish stopper’s latest setback adds to West Ham’s goalkeeper problems and their efforts to re-sign Darren Randolph from Middlesbrough have been held up because he has a thigh injury.

West Ham could barely get out of their own half in the opening stages and John Egan headed just over from Ollie Norwood’s corner before John Lundstram had a shot blocked.

The home side were buoyant, boosted by the news just before kick-off that Wilder had agreed a new four-and-ahalf year deal worth more than £50,000 a week.

The Hammers played their way into the game and should have scored when Egan miscued a header from Martin’s long kick to let in Felipe Anderson, only for the Brazilian to drag his shot wide.

Fleck was a real threat for the Blades with his energy and he shot narrowly wide after his initial effort was blocked.

His drive made the breakthrough on 53 minutes when he pounced on Martin’s errant pass to leave intended recipient Fabian Balbuena stranded before unselfishly squaring for McBurnie to score his fourth goal of the season.

Martin’s gaffe was a real howler and he should also have done better with McBurnie’s shot.

For Hammers fans, it was a familiar sight of one of their keepers dropping a clanger following Roberto’s mistakes when Fabianski was first out.

Martin made partial amends by saving from Lys Mousset before Dean Henderson made a fine one-handed stop to keep out Manuel Lanzini’s free-kick.

Then came the final drama when Snodgrass thought he had equalised only for VAR to give the Blades a break for once.