West Ham 1 Arsenal 2

A really good battling performance today just wasn't good enough to see off Arsenal. In the first half West Ham's midfield, especially the energetic Behrami, got in and disrupted Arsenal's game and West Ham always looked like they could punish Arsenal on the break.

In the last minute of the first half, Kovac won the ball on the halfway line and Behrami knocked a lovely ball through to Diamanti, who left the Arsenal defence for dead and calmly passed the ball into the back of the net.


At the start of the second half West Ham created three chances in the opening three minutes, with Stanislas coming closest with a long-range effort forcing a good save. However after the 60 minute mark West Ham began to tire and Zola had little in the way of options from the bench.

Arsenal however could bring on Nasri and Diaby and, after that, it was all one-way traffic and the Arsenal goals began to look inevitable.



In the end a depleted West Ham team did as well as could be expected. Nouble got another 80 minutes under his belt and looks to be a promising player for the future. Daprela also did very well and also looks to show great promise. However, if the game revealed anything, it is that West Ham desperately need a bit more strength in depth.