SAINTS ALIVE
West Ham 2 Southampton 3
This is the fixture date that Westfield (Stratford) have exercised a stranglehold over in the last five years. Yes, that’s right. A shopping centre stopping a Premier League from playing on Boxing Day. But not this afternoon. Falling sales and common sense have linked arms to give West Ham a last chance opportunity to end 2021 well after the disappointments of a league cup semi-final exit at Spurs earlier in the week.
And yet eight minutes in, Southampton are ahead when Elyounoussi’s effort from outside the area creeps in at the far post past a surprised Fabianski. Try as they might, West Ham seem unable to raise the game, denied the presence of Antonio in the first half. West Ham have won only won one of their last six, and although that was the memorable victory over Chelsea, this team seem to lack both effort and intrigue in their play.
Antonio’s appearance at the start of the second half seems to invigorate the Hammers and they are soon level when he steers Dawson’s goalbound header past Forster. Two minutes later Saints are back in the lead when Dawson’s slo-motion clumsy challenge on Broja outside and then inside the area is breathtakingly turned into a penalty by a weird VAR decision that no one saw coming. Ward-Prowse buries the opportunity gleefully. Two minutes later and Hammers are back level when Benrahma powerfully meets Bowen’s brilliant cross from the right to bulge Forster’s net for the second time. Sadly London Stadium embraces the morgue moment for the third time in 2021-22 when Saints punish West Ham from a set play, conjured by Ward-Prowse and executed by Jan Bednarek’s firm connecting header.
Arsenal and Tottenham have both won, and Hammers will finish the year in the top six, but may end up in fourth place out of the four dominating London Premier League clubs in 2021. The year will have to end with a bang if they aren’t to slump to the mundanity of the pre-Moyes’ years. New signings and the defensive injured returning to the fray may of course put an immediate halt to this. We shall know in a couple of days in this close-packed fixture period.
1 Lucasz Fabiański, 23 Arthur Masuaku, 5 Vladimir Coufal, 41 Declan Rice (c), 15 Craig Dawson, 23 Issa Diop, 8 Pablo Fornals, 28 Tomas Souček, 11 Nikola Vlašić, 10 Manuel Lanzini, 20 Jarrod Bowen
Substitutes: 9 Michail Antonio, 22 Saïd Benrahma, 50 Harrison Ashby
Goalscorers: Michail Antonio, Saïd Benrahma, Andriy Yarmolenko
