West Ham United 3 Brighton & Hove Albion 3
Saturday 1st February 2020
Just a month after beginning his second spell at London Stadium, David Moyes is beginning to realise that saving the club from the dull magnetic pull of the Championship might not be the slam dunk it may have originally appeared. January offered a home win and an FA Cup triumph at Gillingham, but one lone point from four league games and a bundling out of the FA Cup at the hands of Slaven Bilic’s West Brom – Bilic was the man he took over from last time at the club, remember – put the task ahead into focus.
Still, a home fixture against Brighton, a club just two points ahead of West Ham in the table, offered a chance to ‘stop the rot’. In their first attack of the game, Brighton’s Aaron Moy headed a perfectly placed cross wide from the edge of the corner of the six yard box when it looked easier to score. A few minutes later Brighton’s Trossard was put clear but fluffed his finish. The difference between the teams eventually proved to be the power and pace of the returning Antonio, the energy and flair of the Czech debutant Tomáš Souček, and the industrious Robert Snodgrass, someone you would always want to seed your lawn – he would not miss an inch. And it was Snodgrass’ curling concave cross that found Issa Diop at the far post to toe-poke West Ham in front. Snodgrass himself gave Hammers a two goal interval lead on the stroke of half-time with a heavily deflected shot from inside the area from Fredericks’ cross. West Ham’s season was now into February with still only three home games won, but at least this one now looked in the bag.
The new paragraph should indicate that things are never that straightforward with the Hammers. For the neutrals and Brighton fans, their first goal response a couple of minutes into the second half was an absolute comedy classic. Mildly under pressure from Glenn Murray, the returning Brighton striker who always seems to score against West Ham, Fabianski saved him the bother of scoring by punching Pascal Gross’s corner into Ogbonna, and the Italian defender dispatched the assist into the top corner off his back. Despite this unexpected setback, Hammers continued to press forward fired by the running and energy of Michail Antonio, and ten minutes later from a Cresswell corner Snodgrass struck the ball sweetly home from just inside the area, via Bernardo’s head, for his second deflected goal of the game, guaranteeing a double entry on the dodgy goals committee agenda on Monday. With an hour gone, Moyes chose to focus on preserving the lead with a double substitution, replacing Souček and Antonio with Masuaku and Fornals. The tactic made sense, but seemed to take the zip out of the home team’s performance, which they didn’t recover.
Ultimately this game of deflected goals and moments of high comedy enjoyed another rib tickler a quarter of an hour before the end when Diop and Ogbonna tragically froze like twins in a traffic accident to allow Gross in to poke at the ball before Fabianski could reach it, his contact proving just sufficient for it to roll agonisingly slowly into the corner of the net like the pot of an expert snooker player. That still wouldn’t have been enough for a two point surrender, but then five minutes later Murray managed his regular London Stadium goal, his first in the League since the previous May, firing in from close range after appearing to control the ball with his hand. The hated VAR suddenly seemed to be about to intervene in the role of saviour. This time though the various replays proved inconclusive and the goal was given. Lanzini was brought on for the tiring Snodgrass but there was to be no last minute winner. Indeed, had it not been for Fabianski’s Olympic leap to tip over Solly March’s curling, dipping free kick it could have been a completely pointless day out. As it was, West Ham’s season long habit of surrendering leads was again in evidence, as was a first drop into the bottom three. With trips to Manchester City, Liverpool and Arsenal to come in the weeks ahead, things are looking a little tragic.
1 Lucasz Fabianski, 24 Ryan Fredericks, 23 Issa Diop, 21 Angelo Ogbonna, 3 Aaron Cresswell, 16 Mark Noble (captain), 41 Declan Rice, 11 Robert Snodgrass, 26 Tomas Soucek, 30 Michail Antonio, 22 Sebastien Haller
Substitutes: 10 Manuel Lanzini, 18 Pablo Fornals, 26 Arthur Masuaku
Goals: Issa Diop (30), Robert Snodgrass / Adam Webster (45), Robert Snodgrass / Bernardo (57).
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