Match Review: Efficient West Ham Stymie Leading Liverpool

Color me surprised as West Ham hold off Liverpool and impact the Premier League title race. The Hammers looked poised, drilled, and organized in a possession-free draw, pushing Liverpool to the sidelines and taking their chances when there. Here’s the match review.

Alright, let’s get it out in the open. West Ham won this match 1-0. Liverpool scored the opening goal of this match from a play nearly five yards offside, with James Milner in behind Cresswell. The linesman was so far out of position that he missed this, and with the defenders turned off Mane turned and fired home for the 1-0 lead. The match was almost given away as time was expiring with another missed offside call, too.

Now that that’s been said, the Irons had carried play in this match, up to the 22nd minute when Mane scored, and were unjustly behind for reasons outside of their own control. Having put four goals by the Hammers in each of the four previous games, Liverpool were poised to take control of the game at that point if not for West Ham’s chin-up mentality, as the squad continued to press on.

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Two noticeable factors in this match were the intensity of the crowd and the play of West Ham’s wide men. Firstly, if you are reading this and you were at the match hats off to you for building a massive, booming atmosphere. It was clearly encouraging the players on the pitch and it was heard loudly and proudly by supporters who couldn’t attend.

Now onto the wingers. It was a toss up really for man of the match between Felipe Anderson and Michail Antonio. Both players carried the ball well, both players came together to score the goal, and both players frustrated a Liverpool team that relies on its fullbacks getting in on the action.

For me, while Anderson was impressive, it has to be the goals scorer Michail Antonio who rode his pony after scoring the equalizer, for man of the match. He was a constant threat to burst up the wing and provided an aerial outlet for Fabianski to find down the pitch.

The Irons goal, as mentioned, featured both Anderson and Antonio. It seems that all those frustratingly wasted free kicks earlier in the season were in an attempt to drill down routines like this, as Anderson opted for a low, trick play over an over-the-top cross teasing header.

Antonio ran flat across the Liverpool wall while Anderson rolled the ball to Snodgrass who teed it up for him to send in Antonio on a low pass. Antonio made no mistake by pinging the post and bringing West Ham level… legally.

As for the rest of the match, it seemed that West Ham played the opposite of how Liverpool expected them to, most notably by ceding possession and trying to counterattack the counterattackers. Liverpool have abused West Ham in the past by drawing their team forward and cutting them apart on the counter-attack, but they couldn’t deploy this tactic with any success in this match.

By West Ham clogging the midfield with three players and having their centre-backs stepping up constantly to tackle the Liverpool attackers, West Ham forced the Reds to hold onto the ball in non-threatening positions and prodded them for turnovers. Sure, 29% possession seems bad but when you turn that into 10 shots, two on goal, two corner kicks, and one goal it, it doesn’t seem so bad.

West Ham defenders build a wall to stop Liverpool. dark. Next

It was a real complete game from the Hammers who were eventually robbed of all three points. Declan Rice and Issa Diop both had headed opportunities that should have been on net, Noble missed a shot from inside the box, and Chicharito and Aaron Cresswell both had thumping shots go just wide from range. The team was threatening, and with all the eyes of the Premier League upon them showed that they have what it takes to combat the leagues elite.