West Ham United missed the chance to move clear of the Premier League’s relegation zone on Wednesday night with a disastrous 5-1 defeat to Newcastle United at the London Stadium.
The Hammers, suffering their heaviest Premier League home defeat since the opening day of the 2019/20 season, were downed 5-1. After Callum Wilson and Joelinton fired early on, Kurt Zouma’s header gave West Ham hope at half-time. Individual errors from Nayef Aguerd and Lukasz Fabianski gifted Wilson and Alexander Isak goals before Joelinton added a fifth late on.
As West Ham suffered their first home defeat in all competitions this calendar year, here are the major talking points from their humbling by Champions League chasing Newcastle.
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Relegation reality check
Having jumped five places from 19th to 14th with a drab but important 1-0 win over Southampton on Sunday, West Ham had the chance to jump three more places from 15th to 12th when the Geordies came to east London.
West Ham started excellently and within the opening minute, had hit the post when Jarrod Bowen’s cross was almost inadvertently turned in by Newcastle’s Bruno Guimaraes, denied only by the woodwork.
The Hammers continued to dominate the opening minutes, but all it took for West Ham to open the door for their in-form visitors was Thilo Kehrer unnecessarily giving away a cheap corner, heading out of play a long ball when he really had time to control and clear it anywhere else.
Emerson flicked the corner partially away, but Allan Saint-Maximin took possession, shimmied past Said Benrahma, got past Emerson and crossed to Wilson, who headed in his 11th goal in 13 career appearances against West Ham.
One became two less than ten minutes later, as Fabian Schar punched a driven through pass that carved straight through West Ham’s spine and Joelinton latched onto it, took the ball around Lukasz Fabianski and slotted into an empty net. The goal had initially been ruled out for offside, but a VAR check showed Emerson had played him onside, in a horribly awful goal to concede.
Buoyed on by a spirited home crowd who had seen a brief spell of encouragement before Wilson’s opener, West Ham were far from out of it at 2-0, fully knowing that two flashes in the pan had changed the game significantly.
A Lucas Paqueta free-kick, tipped wide by Nick Pope was the first bright spark as West Ham etched their way back into it, helped by Bowen’s tenacity down the wing to win a corner.
Bowen himself stepped up and cleverly flung and in-swinging corner into the box, Michail Antonio’s pressure on Pope at a corner was enough to bamboozle him as Zouma headed home, a goal with similarities to Paqueta’s equaliser at St James’ Park two months ago.
Antonio came close to a goal of his own after a great driving run from Rice led to him teeing up the Jamaican, whose control and finish needed a superb Sven Botman challenge to cut it out.
At half-time, whilst behind, the timing of Zouma’s goal gave West Ham plenty of momentum going into the break, with an excellent home backing in the first half giving many reason for hope at the interval.
That hope, optimism and in some circles, confidence, of a second half fightback were dashed within just seconds. As Fabianski rolled the ball out to centre-back Aguerd, he took too long on the ball, took three touches, missed the ball with the fourth and found himself quickly dispossessed and by the time Aguerd could react, Wilson was already celebrating his second goal of the night, having been teed up by tackler and creator Jacob Murphy.
Given West Ham had a whole half to do it, 3-1 seemed an unlikely scoreline to turn around, but it was still possible, helped with Fabianski doing well to stop Murphy and Saint-Maximin chances in quick succession.
Moyes, who could still see potential in what would have been a superb turnaround made a quadruple substitution as Danny Ings, Maxwel Cornet, Flynn Downes and Vladimir Coufal were all thrown in just after an hour, but none of them could have any say or even predicted what would happen when Bruno Guimaraes sent substitute Isak onto a long chasing pass with less than ten minutes to go.
Guimaraes fractionally overhit through pass was looking all set to be cleared by the rushing Fabianski, only for the experienced Polish stopper to get a tame thigh to the ball, with it landing to Isak, 25 yards out and with essentially an open net to aim at, a gift Newcastle’s £60million striker simply could not say no to.
The London Stadium, which had already started to empty minutes before Isak’s goal, quickly became very vacant at 4-1, with hardly any home fans inside the 62,500 seater when Joelinton’s shot on a counter attack across goal put the final nail in the coffin.
At full-time, Moyes said: “We gave away a terrible first and second goal but not as bad as the third and fourth goal,” probably a polite understatement. It really was that damning.
West Ham are fortunate in the sense that they have not fallen league positions and their goal difference does help them in the relegation battle. Losing at home to a Newcastle side who seem probably to be in the Champions League next season, is no crime or shock, but the manner of the scoreline and how Newcastle made the most of West Ham’s shambolic defending has the potential to cause a lot more damage than the Premier League table suggests.
A point or three would have helped the Hammers, who now face a trip to Fulham and host league leaders Arsenal in their next two games, knowing they will probably need to take one, or multiple points, from those games before their next relegation six-pointer away at Bournemouth on April 23.
David Moyes’ future admission
On several occasions this season, a poor West Ham result has led to fans calling for the club to sack Moyes.
On virtually all of those moments, Moyes has been self-assured in his response, confident in the knowledge that he has the backing of the club’s hierarchy of his position and the backing they have in him.
But, for the first time all season, Moyes hinted that he knew a result like the defeat to Newcastle is likely to put him in trouble.
“As a manager, you always have to do it. I'm sitting here, standing up, and I have to come up front and answer the questions,” said Moyes .
“You've watched the game. You can write what you see. I'm a big boy, I've left jobs at other times in the past and if this one happens, well then I would have to go with that if that's the case. I really like my job here. I really like the people I work for.
“I've enjoyed my time greatly and I'm hoping there are a couple of big days ahead of us in the not-too-distant future.”
It is the first time West Ham’s manager has spoken like that, a manager potentially at risk of losing his job.
Given the Hammers’ repeated backing in him, one defeat to a top four side feels unlikely to change those thoughts, but Moyes comments does give food for thought that he knows there is pressure on him.
Although Leicester City and Chelsea have recently parted company with their managers, with just ten league games left in the middle of a relegation battle, it would seem more risky and more damaging to change managers at this late stage. Many windows of opportunities have presented themselves this season and always, West Ham have showed Moyes plenty of faith. To continue to do so seems like the logical choice right now, even if many supporters disagree.
Individual errors costly
The nature of the defeat will have caused plenty of anger, but what cannot be ignored as the sheer volume of individual errors in the game from West Ham’s players.
The first goal comes from Kehrer unnecessarily conceding a corner before Benrahma and Emerson fail to stop Saint-Maximin’s cross to an unmarked Wilson to make it 1-0.
There was a lot wrong about the second goal too, as incisive as Schar’s through ball was, one pass should not cut through a team’s spine like it did, not helped by both full-backs Emerson and Kehrer keeping Joelinton onside.
As if the first two goals were not error-filled enough, goals three and four were even worse. Aguerd was caught dithering on the ball in similar circumstances to an error he made in last month’s FA Cup defeat to Manchester United.
Rarely, does a team concede a goal like Aguerd’s in a game, but Fabianski went some way to match it when completely fluffing his lines at an attempted clearance to stop Isak getting through on goal, instead gifting him a seventh Premier League goal of the season.
Substitute Coufal was then caught badly out of position by Guimaraes’ stunning through ball for Joelinton to make it 5-1, but by that point, the damage was well and truly done and hardly any home fans in the London Stadium were left there to see it.
For all the pressure that will have vamped up on Moyes after that defeat, the players have to take a significant chunk of the responsibility, especially with all of those goals containing very rectifiable errors.
West Ham’s players have to ensure that mistakes like that simply do not happen in the last ten league games of the season, otherwise they are at serious risk of finding themselves walking towards an unwanted return to the Championship.
Home fans’ U-turn speaks volumes
Given the rather limp nature of West Ham’s 1-0 win over Southampton, supporters could be forgiven for not being quite on their full singing voice for a home game against a Newcastle side who are destined for Europe next season.
Far from it, in fact, the noise minutes before kick-off and the opening minutes of the tie showed a fan base really behind their players, even at 2-0 down and that there was a real belief that West Ham could get a result against their Tyneside opponents.
The noise either side of Zouma’s goal, whether it was at winning a corner, free-kick or going close to a goal really built an atmosphere, one that in the first half, eclipsed any home atmosphere from this season to date.
There was real potential to build on that in the second half, but little over 20 seconds in and Aguerd’s agonising blunder quickly undid all of that.
In fairness, there was still that support at 3-1 for most of the second half, although as West Ham’s chances of a fightback quickly evaporated, so too did the noise and in many cases, the supporters themselves.
When Isak converted smoothly at the end of Fabianski’s fumble, Newcastle fans chanted ‘you’re getting sacked in the morning’ a chant which a number of West Ham fans joined in with, repeating it at the end of the game and with boos to follow at full-time.
The support was excellent in the first half, Moyes even went out of his way to praise it in his post-match press conference, but the U-turn from the Irons faithful over the course of the game showed the fragility of confidence fans have had in their players and manager this season, and often, deservedly so.
Home form ends disastrously
West Ham’s 5-1 drubbing was the first time they had lost a home match since losing 2-0 to Brentford on December 30.
Results at home had been key for West Ham in 2023 and in general, for much of the season, with West Ham picking up an alarming lack of points in the Premier League on their travels this season.
Prior to the Newcastle nightmare, West Ham had gone six games unbeaten at home in all competitions, winning four and drawing two.
However, that confidence they had built up in front of their own crowd will have dwindled, a worry considering the next four home matches are against Arsenal, Gent, Liverpool and Manchester United.
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