Said Benrahma scored from the penalty spot to help West Ham produce one of the close football results of the weekend in the Premier League. West Ham started the game in the bottom three following Bournemouth’s stunning win over Liverpool on Saturday, and it looked like they would stay there when Ollie Watkins headed Villa in front (17), scoring in his fourth successive Premier League away game. West Ham was given a reprieve, though, when Villa forward Leon Bailey conceded a penalty after very little touch with Lucas Paqueta. Benrahama made no mistake with his equalizer (26). The result lifts David Moyes’ team out of the relegation zone and above Bournemouth on goal difference, ending Villa’s two-game winning streak and relieving some of the strain that had built up following last Saturday’s 4-0 thumping at Brighton.
After a cagey start, Watkins headed in Alex Moreno’s cross in Villa’s first assault, earning his fifth Premier League goal since the World Cup. Only Marcus Rashford (10) and Erling Haaland (10) have more in that period. West Ham, on the other hand, scored soon from the spot after Bailey was penalized for a soft challenge on Paqueta. VAR took a cursory look before Benrahama smashed the ball into the roof of the net, away from Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez’s grasp, to square the score.
The hosts squandered chances, with Benrahma and Kurt Zouma missing from inside the box, and were nearly punished, only for stand-in goalkeeper Alphonse Areola to make a fantastic save to prevent Watkins from extending Villa’s lead from inside the six-yard box. Within a minute of the game restarting, Benrahma was provided with a chance, but his left-footed volley was comfortably saved by Martinez as West Ham pushed for the lead. The game became tense, but neither team was good enough to win.
After an hour, Villa began to fade and had to rely on their goalkeeper again, who pushed over a long-range effort from Benrahma cutting in from the left. In the closing seconds, substitute Ashley Young made a crucial block to deny the West Ham forward another effort from within the box.
West Ham substitute Maxwel Cornet had a golden opportunity to win the game in stoppage time, but he took an unusual stepover before hitting straight at Martinez. Replays showed that he ran too soon and was eventually marked offside, but he will feel that he should have timed his run better and won the game for his team. Moyes’ team led for the whole of the second half but was unable to create the clear chances required to secure only their third Premier League victory of 2023. Despite the fact that they are no longer in the bottom three, the home fans expressed their displeasure with a chorus of boos at full-time.
“I observed everything and have complete faith in the officials. Yet, in my perspective now, it is a pretty light penalty. I’m relieved since we knew this would be a difficult match. We had better control of the game in the first half, but they pushed us and had chances. The second half was a little more open than we would have liked,” Aston Villa head coach Unai Emery said. “We had a moment where we were in complete control, and that could have been the time when we scored the second goal and won the game. It was a reasonable outcome. The outcome is favorable. This result implies that we will not escape the bottom three clubs, but we will maintain our lead above West Ham. We blew the potential to get close to the top teams today.”
“The second-half performance was far better. We lost two points in the end as a result of the chances we produced. We played well in the second half. That was difficult at first. The most important thing was to obtain a result [in the European Conference League] on Thursday. We wanted a performance today because the performance wasn’t where we wanted it to be. Overall, I’m quite satisfied,” West Ham head coach David Moyes said. “It was a squandered opportunity not to grab the second goal, and our effort in the second half deserved it. The guys performed admirably at times, but we were unable to score a second goal. The season has been defined by missed opportunities. We had four or five nice chances but never got anything that tidy. Maybe a little more quality at the end could have gotten us more.”
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