Jacob Steinberg was our man at the London Stadium this evening. His report has landed, so get those fingers a-tapping. Thanks for reading this MBM. Nighty night!
David Moyes gives, under the circumstances, an impressively calm and considered verdict. “We were in it. I didn’t think we played particularly well, certainly in the first half, but we played much better in the second. We showed a bit of character and more desire and we affected them more. But the red card changes the last 10-15 minutes of the game when we were hoping to put them under more pressure. I am pleased the game didn’t get away from us, but we’re feeling a little bit unlucky that we didn’t do a little bit better. The red card is a decision made by someone who has never played the game. I don’t know where Balbuena is supposed to plant his foot. Then if they do think that, Coufal on Rudiger was a very similar challenge but they did nothing about it. So was there a consistent message to both of them? I don’t see how it’s a red card. He’s kicked through the ball, I don’t think for one moment there’s a bit of malice. I thought it was a rubbish decision. We would have had a chance to put them under pressure. We’ll go again, we’re in a decent position, and we’re right in the mix for some form of European football, and I’ll keep pushing to make that the Champions League if we can.”
A very content Thomas Tuchel speaks to Sky. “The boys are very happy. It was a great performance, an amazing result and a deserved win for us. The last half an hour was excellent, and the start of the match for a very long time was excellent, so very well deserved. It was very tough to play, but to hurt them with ball possession was hard. We had a good mix between passing and counter-pressing. It reminded me of the Atletico Madrid games, because they had the individual and physical quality to hurt you. Timo Werner could have made it more comfortable, but I am very happy because he played a very good match. He had one or two decisions where he was not precise enough but he had a very good game. We did not talk one word about Super League from Tuesday on. Everyone enjoyed the focus on just the game. I was confident. We have crucial matches in the Premier League, the Champions League and the FA Cup. We can win these matches and deliver. We can trust ourselves. I am happy we came up with an intense performance.” And as for the upcoming semi-final against Real Madrid? “Ha ha! Only easy matches coming up!”
Chelsea’s hero Timo Werner talks to Sky. “The second chance I had to score, but to come back slowly with one goal is enough. To score twice today may be too much for the beginning! No, joking. I am very happy that we won this game today, it’s very important in the race for the top four. After waiting for so long, it’s the best feeling to score the goal. It’s really important for me, and I am happy I am back on the scoresheet. It was a really big win, the draw against Brighton was hard for us. We have a lot of strong teams ahead of us, and a big game on Tuesday, so it was really important.”
FULL TIME: West Ham United 0-1 Chelsea
There’s just enough time for Mount to Gazza his way down the left and stand one up for Abraham, who heads over from a couple of yards, and then the whistle goes. A huge smile plays across Thomas Tuchel’s face as his side go three points clear of West Ham in fourth place, while David Moyes storms off under a cloud. I suspect his post-match interview will be interesting, in the wake of Balbuena’s dismissal.
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90 min +5: A booking for Kante now. Chelsea are not fussed.
90 min +4: Mendy is booked for taking a professional amount of time over the resulting goal kick. Meanwhile replays show Coufal hoicking clear under pressure from Rudiger, and his studs landing on the big defender’s thigh. Not a great deal of difference between that and the Balbuena challenge, other than the optics being a bit worse. Who’d be a referee, huh? Never mind a VAR operative.
90 min +3: ... and neither, as West Ham stream up the other end, is Benrahma’s long-distance effort.
90 min +2: The corner is no good.
90 min +1: Mount shoots again from distance, despite having Chilwell in acres on the left. A poor decision, though the shot’s deflected and he wins a corner instead.
90 min: There will be five extra minutes.
89 min: West Ham’s comeback attempt has been robbed of all momentum by that red card and the Chelsea substitutions.
87 min: Now Abraham comes on in slow-motion to replace Werner. Thomas Tuchel is simply pressing his opposite number’s buttons now.
86 min: Azpilicueta is replaced by James, and takes his sweet time over departing. When he leaves the field of play, David Moyes offers the Chelsea captain some beneficial advice. Azpilcueta juts out his chest in the classic hold-me-back style. He’s fortunate that someone indeed hauls him away from danger, because while Moyes is 57, with a good quarter of a century on the Chelsea man, you wouldn’t back against him in too many rumbles.
85 min: A free kick for Chelsea, the best part of 30 yards out. Mount takes and batters it straight into the wall. Full marks for vaulting ambition, if nothing else.
83 min: Johnson comes on for Fredericks. Despite it all, there’s still only one goal in this, and Moyes shouts on some instructions accordingly.
RED CARD: Balbuena (West Ham)
81 min: Yep, it’s red. It didn’t look like Balbuena meant it, but his action ultimately put Chilwell in danger. That’s unfortunate, but the referee had little option, though David Moyes certainly doesn’t see it that way. Happily Chilwell is fit to continue.
79 min: A VAR check as Balbuena punts clear, his studs then planting on the back of Chilwell’s leg as part of the follow-through. I don’t think it was intentional - and nobody on the pitch is annoyed - but Chilwell’s been hurt, it looks ugly, and there’s a case for saying it was dangerous play anyway. This could be a red card.
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78 min: Werner snaffles a loose ball and makes it into the West Ham box down the left. He should be shooting, clean through, but hesitates and the chance is gone.
77 min: Nothing much happening on the pitch right now, so I can exclusively reveal that Sky Sports co-commentator Chris Coleman has a bad cold. He’s sniffing and snivelling away like a patron of Studio 54 in the late 70s. Someone please, give the poor man a hankie.
75 min: West Ham continue to press and harry, but Chelsea look fairly self-assured right now.
73 min: Chelsea make their first change. Pulisic makes way for Ziyech.
71 min: Fredericks spins Azpilicueta with absurd ease down the left. For a second it looks as though he’ll be romping clear, but Christensen has read the danger well and storms across to win not only the ball but a throw as well.
69 min: West Ham make a double change. Fornals and Noble are replaced by Lanzini and Benrahma. David Moyes has clearly decided to go for it.
67 min: Werner romps down the right, enters the box, doubles back a little, then spins and smashes a shot towards the bottom right. Fabianski parries well. A fine run by the Chelsea striker, who this season has so often made the difficult look easy and the easy absurdly difficult.
65 min: Pulisic dribbles elegantly down the middle, nearly opening West Ham up. He’d have probably found himself free on goal, had Kante opted to return a prompt for a one-two ... but the ball didn’t come back to the USA star, so the move fizzles out.
63 min: ... but so is Mount, who curls towards the top right from 25 yards. It requires Fabianski to extend fully, then smother a loose ball from the rebound, to deal with the danger.
62 min: Lingard is electric in full flow. He glides down the middle of the park, drawing a couple of men before flicking insouciantly towards Fornals to his left. Fornals has the opportunity to drive at a Chelsea defence that’s been pulled out of shape, but forgets to take the ball with him. West Ham are playing well.
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60 min: Noble drives down the right and cuts back for Fredericks, who pelts hard towards goal. Christensen blocks bravely. Lingard picks up the rebound and loops a shot towards the top right. It only just sails wide. West Ham have responded really well to nearly going two down.
59 min: A West Ham free kick wide on the left. Everyone lines up on the edge of the box in expectation of the long cross. Lingard tries the old Gary McAllister trick, whipping straight for the bottom left. He doesn’t trick Mendy, who gathers a weakly hit shot with ease.
57 min: A couple of half-chances for West Ham in quick succession, as Fornals shoots from distance, then Bowen loses control of his feet when in possession 12 yards out. That escape up the other end might have woken the hosts from their slumber.
55 min: It should be two. Mount, just to the right of the D, sends a short-backlift shot towards the bottom left. Fabianski sticks out a strong arm to parry at full stretch. It’s a great save, but the ball drops to Werner, who simply has to sidefoot into an unguarded goal ... but opens his body and sends his effort bobbling apologetically wide right! That’s an awful miss. His play today otherwise has been fine. This match has been his up-and-down season in microcosm.
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53 min: Chelsea wrest control and move play upfield. Mount makes ground down the right and crosses. Coufal hoicks clear. It’s a fairly undistinguished start to the second half, truth be told.
51 min: West Ham continue to press Chelsea high. The visitors can’t get out of their final third. It’s like the 10-15 minutes before the Werner goal again.
50 min: West Ham clip it around crisply, though they don’t really go anywhere in particular.
48 min: Mount spins Ogbonna and threatens to zip clear down the middle. Ogbonna does extremely well to extend a leg and respond with a last-ditch block to hook the ball away from the Chelsea midfielder.
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46 min: West Ham are on the front foot quickly. Some space for Bowen down the right. He loops high into the centre. Mendy rises through the half-time bubbles to claim.
West Ham get the second half underway. No changes.
Half-time entertainment. Here comes Ringmaster Perez and the rest of the circus.
HALF TIME: West Ham United 0-1 Chelsea
West Ham amble off in a mild funk, Timo Werner having instigated a fine smash and grab at the end of a half the hosts were beginning to dominate. It’s only Werner’s second goal in the last 23 Premier League matches. Some time to get it!
45 min: That was a really slick move from Chelsea, who rope-a-doped West Ham upfield, then delivered a rapier thrust. There will be one extra minute of this first half.
GOAL! West Ham United 0-1 Chelsea (Werner 43)
West Ham had been bossing it of late, but Chelsea sucker-punch them as Werner comes alive. And how! He battles Ogbonna in the centre of the park and spins, rolling a pass wide left for Pulisic, who shuttles on for Chilwell. The full back cuts back towards Werner, who having started the move, kept on trucking. He arrives in the box and slaps a confident sidefoot into the bottom right!
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41 min: Lingard spins in the centre of the park and tears down the middle. He’s got options either side, with Fornals free down the left and Bowen in acres on the right. So Christensen does what he has to do, placing a cynical hand on both of Lingard’s shoulders, and taking a booking for the team.
40 min: West Ham have enjoyed 60 percent of possession since the half-hour mark, which is some old swing since 29 mins, when Chelsea were on 73 percent for the entire game.
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39 min: That’s no good either. Even so, West Ham will be happy with this, pinning Chelsea back for the first time this evening. It’s a good period for the hosts.
38 min: But the hosts come again and win their third corner of the match, down the right. Bowen to take.
37 min: The resulting corner is a waste of time and energy.
36 min: The free kick’s flung into the mixer. After some head tennis, Soucek flicks goalwards, aiming for the bottom left. Azpilicueta chests down and bundles the ball out for a corner. Mr VAR checks for a penalty, because of course he does, a suggestion that Azpilicueta guided the ball onto his own arm. But no.
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35 min: That might change now, as Werner slides in on the in-flight Lingard from behind. A booking, and a free kick out on the left. West Ham line up on the edge of the Chelsea box.
34 min: Noble shimmies down the middle before sending the ball wide right for Coufal, who shakes his hips before whipping a cross into the mixer. Chelsea deal with it well, though that was a nice build-up from West Ham, who have yet to make any attempt on goal whatsoever.
33 min: Rudiger channels his inner Beckenbauer and strides down the inside-left channel. He slips a pass wide left for Chilwell, whose dinked cross only just eludes Werner in the middle. Signs that after a quiet period, Chelsea are beginning to ask some questions again.
31 min: Mount meanders down the right and rolls infield for Werner, who has his back to goal. He spins and shoots, but it’s always going high and wide right. For a brief second there, West Ham were exposed.
30 min: Mount and Diop get involved in a petulant shoving match over a free kick in the middle of the park. It all calms down quickly enough. Nothing else is happening.
29 min: Chelsea have enjoyed 73 percent of the possession so far. They’ve done very little with it since those early exchanges.
28 min: A West Ham clearance nearly turns into a killer through ball, Bowen chasing it down the middle. He’d be free, had Mendy not spotted the danger early, racing from his box and heading clear.
26 min: Fredericks threatens to tear clear of Azpilicueta down the left, but the Chelsea captain sticks in a toe to deflect out for a corner. From the set piece, Chelsea threaten to break up the other end, but Mount runs down a dead end on the left wing.
24 min: Fourth and fifth are cancelling each other out right now.
22 min: It’s a non-event. Like West Ham before them, Chelsea must wait a little longer for their tenth goal of the season from a corner.
21 min: Werner dribbles back and forth across the front of the West Ham box. He works just enough space to shoot, and his low drive is deflected out for a corner on the right.
19 min: The game suddenly becomes extremely scrappy. Periods of possession longer than two seconds come at a premium right now.
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17 min: Chelsea pass and probe, probe and pass. Finally Jorginho swings one in from the right. Werner rises but is beaten to the header by Balbuena.
15 min: Werner grooves his way down the right and pulls back for Pulisic, racing in to meet the low cross, 12 yards out. He sidefoots towards the bottom right, but not particularly powerfully, and it’s an easy claim for Fabianski.
14 min: Fredericks is sent scampering down the left at speed. He’s only got Bowen up with him, though, and he’s surrounded by four blue shirts. So Fredericks opts to go it alone instead. His shot from a tight angle is fierce, but always rising over the bar.
13 min: A free kick out on the West Ham right. Bowen swings it into the box. Soucek competes aerially with Christensen but loses out. Chelsea clear their lines. West Ham have worked their way into this match after a cold start.
11 min: West Ham win the first corner of the evening down the right. Bowen takes; Mendy claims easily. It’s slightly surprising that the delivery was so bad: no team has scored more goals from corners this season than West Ham (nine). That’s a record shared by Chelsea, by the way. Plenty of excitement to come this evening from the old set pieces, you’d imagine.
10 min: Up the other end, Mount makes himself some space for a shot just to the right of the D. Fabianski smothers, helped by the fact it was straight at him.
9 min: West Ham surround Chilwell in the centre circle to win the ball. Bowen tears forward with Lingard just to his left. He should release his team-mate, but delays the pass unnecessarily, and when it finally comes, Lingard is offside. A dangerous situation wasted.
7 min: West Ham steady the ship a little, in so much as their high press keeps Chelsea in their own half awhile. But the visitors are still hogging possession.
5 min: Azpilicueta tears down the right and crosses. The ball is spectacularly cleared by the horizontal Ogbonna. It’s a fast start by the visitors. West Ham have hardly had a touch during these opening exchanges.
4 min: Some space for Mount down the right. He cuts back from the byline and finds Werner, who aims a first-time riser towards the top left. Always wide and high, but it was a tricky chance and the build-up was swift and smooth.
2 min: A fairly quiet start on a sunny evening. Chelsea have seen more of the ball.
Chelsea get the ball rolling ... but only after everyone takes a knee of love, solidarity, fairness and respect. There’s no room for racism. Challenge it. Report it. Change it. Kick it out.
The teams are out! West Ham wear their claret , Chelsea their royal blue. We’ll be off in a couple of minutes, after a quick blow of those pretty bubbles.
Moyes has also been talking to Sky Sports. “We’ve got a tough game against a really tough side, but it’s a challenge and we’re going to try to take it on. We want to do well, but there was much more pressure last year than this. But we want to play well and finish on a high. We beat Chelsea here 3-2 last season, probably to stay up, so if we could do that again it’d be very good. Injuries are part and parcel of football at all clubs, but undoubtedly we’re short at this present time. Chelsea look as though they’re playing in a really good style, they’re in the semi-finals of the Champions League and the FA Cup final, they’re not only a top side but a top squad. They’re able to change their players around quite a bit and keep them fresh. But if we play them as well as we did last year, we’ll be happy.”
On the subject of super leagues ... West Ham boss David Moyes has been thinking.
Chelsea honeymooner Thomas Tuchel tells Sky how he put the Super League nonsense to the back of his mind. “We took the normal approach before the game. Me, personally, I switched off all internet around me, no news, no football after the Tuesday game. So totally normal approach. Business as usual. Big game coming up. It’s big but not decisive, and if you see the schedule we have, nothing is decided after this match. But we want the three points. We know how hard it is but we are prepared for that. We have a good record in away matches and we know we have to deliver a top performance.”
West Ham make two changes to the team that lost at Newcastle last weekend. Fabian Balbuena and Ryan Fredericks replace Ben Johnson and the suspended Craig Dawson.
Chelsea make six alterations to the team that drew listlessly with Brighton. Edouard Mendy, Cesar Azpilicueta, Thiago Silva, Ben Chilwell, N’Golo Kante and Timo Werner replace Kepa, Kurt Zouma, Marcos Alonso, Reece James, Hakim Ziyech and Kai Havertz.
The teams
West Ham United: Fabianski, Diop, Balbuena, Ogbonna, Coufal, Noble, Soucek, Fredericks, Fornals, Lingard, Bowen.
Subs: Yarmolenko, Benrahma, Lanzini, Alves, Johnson, Trott, Randolph, Odubeko, Coventry.
Chelsea: Mendy, Christensen, Thiago Silva, Rudiger, Azpilicueta, Kante, Jorginho, Chilwell, Mount, Pulisic, Werner.
Subs: Arrizabalaga, Alonso, Abraham, Zouma, Hudson-Odoi, Ziyech, Gilmour, James, Havertz.
Referee: Chris Kavanagh (Lancashire).
Preamble
Just six games of the season remaining, and a top-four finish within touching distance: it would be a huge match whoever was contesting it. But the participation of West Ham United adds a little extra spice. They were nobody’s pre-season pick for a run at the Champions League places, but look at where the rejuvenated David Moyes has got them. This is on!
They’re good enough to make it … but can they hold their nerve? Tonight’s opponents Chelsea have been around this particular block on many an occasion; this is virgin territory for the Hammers, whose previous high watermark in the top flight was third in pre-Champions League 1986. They lost their last fixture at Newcastle United, were beaten 3-0 by Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in December, and will be without the influential trio of Declan Rice, Michail Antonio and Craig Dawson this evening. On the other hand, Chelsea have a massive Champions League semi against Real Madrid coming up on Tuesday evening, and lost this fixture rather spectacularly last season. So good luck calling this. It’s on!
Kick off: 5.30pm BST.
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