If West Ham progress gradually, Bournemouth may be regressing to their mean. Gary O’Neil finished the game wagging his fingers at referee David Coote and repeatedly criticized VAR Mike Dean’s decisions, but greater Premier League experience and squad depth had said .
The VAR controversy this time was over Thilo Kehrer’s handball in the build-up to Kurt Zouma’s first goal and Jordan Zemura’s hand that led to Saïd Benrahma’s final and decisive penalty. Bournemouth had also escaped what looked like a red card for Jefferson Lerma’s high lunge on Gianluca Scamacca.
“Since I’ve been here, there’s been 10 serious VAR checks and none have gone our way,” said O’Neil, speaking like a bitter old man rather than someone eight games into his fledgling managerial career. Lerma’s crimes were not mentioned and a tenure as interim manager that has hosted three British prime ministers and two monarchs is entering its first downfall. “It will be difficult for a team newly promoted to the Premier League against good opposition,” he admitted.
The defeat at the London Stadium, Bournemouth’s second in successive games, where West Ham rained down 20 shots against five faced by Lukasz Fabianski cost injuries to key striker Dominic Solanke and first-choice goalkeeper Neto. “Solanke is a great player for us and we have to go without him,” O’Neil said. Solanke left the stadium wearing a protective boot. The Premier League’s smallest team, perhaps its least distinguished, have three games to go before a well-deserved World Cup break.
“I haven’t seen any of the incidents,” said David Moyes. “But our performance deserved better goals than the ones we scored. We definitely deserved to win the game.”
His team maintains its useful habit of getting the win when the pressure is on. They had started in 17th but climbed to 10th after weekend wins at Leicester and Aston Villa had proved unhelpful for a side 12 points worse off at this stage last season. The threat of a relegation battle has been offset by an October in which only Liverpool have beaten West Ham in five games. It was a third win for Bournemouth in this run of games.
Thilo Kehrer looks to handle the ball in preparation for Kurt Zouma’s goal. Photograph: David Klein/Reuters
Until the later stages, when O’Neil said his side had “camped West Ham”, Bournemouth sat deep and in numbers, as you might expect from a team averaging 7.8 shots a game before the match represented an all-time Premier. low league However, Fabianski was the first goalkeeper to come into action, called upon to smother a Solanke effort. Still, neither team looked particularly potent; West Ham had only scored two previous first-half goals in the league all season. Flynn Downes’ aggression and runs from deep in support of Gianluca Scamacca at center forward were the most enterprising feature of the first half. The midfielder’s chance to score West Ham’s first goal came from Ben Johnson’s cross but the shot was blocked.
“Declan Rice and Tomas Soucek have had slow starts and are starting to find their feet and we are trying to bring in new players,” Moyes said. “Now our performances in the league have started to improve and we are chasing the teams above us in the league.”
When Neto pulled up with a muscle injury, the Brazilian could only last until half-time and was replaced by Ireland’s Mark Travers. Perhaps the visitors’ best chance came after Soucek, failing to look up, inadvertently played in Solanke. It was to prove fateful. The striker was hit by Kehrer while shooting and limped off to be replaced by the gigantic and effective Kieffer Moore. This immediately preceded West Ham’s controversial first goal. After Jarrod Bowen’s corner, Zouma nodded and while Kehrer’s volley looked clear and obvious, VAR saw through.
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“It’s a handball 100 times out of 100,” O’Neil said. “I thought it was a terrible decision.” The explanation given was that Kehrer’s intervention had neither been deliberate nor directly preceded the goal; the ball had come off a Bournemouth header to Zouma.
Then came Lerma’s lunge on Scamacca, almost to the knees. This was adjudged a yellow rather than a red, the Colombian very lucky that Scamacca played instead of going down.
Moyes caused Michail Antonio to scramble to occupy the Bournemouth defence, but struggled to hold on to the ball. This invited Bournemouth. The aerial power of Philip Billing and Moore was at the forefront of the struggling try, only for VAR to intervene again. Zemura, as a substitute, and slid off the field, could not deflect Vladimir Coufal’s cross. “Bad luck,” O’Neil said. “His hand was coming down again.”
Penalty awarded, Benrahma slotted home, West Ham’s path to mid-table was set. It is Bournemouth, despite O’Neil’s sense of injustice, who must begin to look down.