West Ham forward Michail Antonio joked about his dislike for VAR on Wednesday evening following his side’s 3-2 victory over Chelsea in the Premier League – a game in which the Hammers had a goal disallowed for offside after a near-four-minute check.
West Ham thought they had taken the lead late in the first half when Tomas Soucek turned the ball in from close range, only for the strike to be ruled out due to Antonio supposedly blocking Chelsea goalkeeper Kepa Arrizabalaga’s line of vision from an offside position.
Soucek later successfully levelled for the hosts after Willian had scored for Chelsea from the spot, and Antonio then struck to give David Moyes’ team the lead. Willian netted again with a free-kick, but Antonio turned provider for West Ham substitute Andriy Yarmolenko to seal the win in the 89th minute.
“I really dislike VAR, I really dislike it!” said Antonio, laughing about the first-half incident.
“This season so many things have not gone our way. But today it didn’t stop us, we just kept going, and we got the victory.
“It was hard, [Chelsea] play unbelievable football, and they kept pinning us in. It is a massive result.”
The win lifts West Ham to 16th in the table on 30 points – three points above the relegation zone with six games remaining.
“Man, there’s been so many games where we’ve been just so close, and today we had a goal taken away from us,” Antonio continued.
“We went 1-0 down, we drew level and then went down again – but managed to come back and win it.
“It shows the belief we’ve got, the grit we’ve got and that we’re not going to give up, we’ll fight until the end.”
Frank Lampard’s Chelsea stay fourth in the standings on 54 points following their loss. They are one point behind Leicester – who were beaten 2-1 by Everton on Wednesday evening – and two ahead of Manchester United.
