It's rained all morning and the Overground is down yet again — it's not a promising start to Sunday. Inside the stadium are Fraser in his Humphrey Bogart raincoat, Matt wearing a yellow hoodie (is he now a Watford fan?), Lisa, Michael the Whovian and Nigel, fresh from completing his 92 league grounds at exotic Barrow.
Up against a team that hasn't won away all season — what could possibly go wrong? Palace have much the better of the first 19 minutes, as Eze tests Fabianski with a free kick and then drags a good chance wide. Eze, Zaha, Olise and Ayew are a fluid attack for Palace while West Ham look strangely jaded despite resting the senior players on Thursday.
Bur slowly West Ham get into the game more and take a surprise lead. Paqueta finds Benrahma with a short ball and the lille Algerian sidesteps a defender to send a rocket into the top corner. A great goal.
It looks like the Hammers will take the lead into the break until Fabianski rolls the ball out to Dawson, whose overhit pass is miscontrolled by Kehrer. Eze pounces and sets up Zaha for a crisp finish. Maybe it's all because Nigel has not eaten his lucky banana.
Scamacca has played a few decent balls out wide but generally struggled to hold the ball up in the first half and is replaced by Antonio at the break. Gianluca still seems to be adapting to the PL and his form has slumped in recent weeks, which is worrying.
The Irons improve a bit but quire often the passing is woeful. When the lively Benrahma is subbed by Lanzini there's open dissent from the crowd and a chant of, "Oh Said Benrahma!" Moyes later reveals that Benrahma was carrying a knee injury but also adds that he didn't think Said did much after his goal — Moyes really needs to stop digging out Benrahma, as he's clearly a confidence player. The substitution of the previously untouchable Soucek for Downes gets ironic cheers.
Antonio is struggling to hold it up just as Scamacca did, but causes problems with his strength. When Lanzini finds Antonio he loses his defender with a great turn, nears the goalkeeper and then rather than shoot or pass to Paqueta, falls to the ground. The ref gives a penalty, only for VAR to correctly overturn it.
"Why can you not pass it?!!" asks the incensed Vicar's Son as the Hammers continue to lose possession, with Bowen working hard but toiling and the Hammers missing Coufal's attacking runs. Dawson almost turns the ball into his own net but is saved by Fabianski, while a great tackle from the defender denies Zaha. Have both sides now settled for a draw?
ANTONIO WOE
With four minutes of added time West Ham stream forward in search of a late winner. Antonio bounces off a defender and races into the right side of the box. He could fire it hard and low to try and get a deflection or a corner. Or just waste some time. But instead he lofts a feeble chip into the arms of Guaita.
The next 15 seconds seem pre-ordained. Guaita plays it out, Eze finds Olise, and the Palace winger's shot takes a wicked deflection off Cresswell to fly into the top corner with the last kick of the game. The Palace fans go wild, while we feel bad all over. The scoreboard reads WHU 1 CRY 2, which seems very apt.
At least the Eagle has bottles of Spitfire in the fridge as we resort to drink and Spurs versus Liverpool. Nigel tells us about Barrow and wants to wind-up Klopp. Matt recalls Terry Pratchett stories and Michael pumps us for information on Stranger Things — which being about kids in an upside down world sounds curiously like West Ham. Moyes has declared, "we shot ourselves in the foot", prompting Matt to quip that it's surprising we didn't miss.
A very unsatisfactory afternoon with a difficult game against Leicester to come before the World Cup break. Urgent improvement is needed.
PLAYER RATINGS: Fabianski 6; Kehrer 5, Dawson 5, Zouma 6, Cresswell 6; Rice 6, Soucek 5, (Downes 5), Benrahma 7 (Lanzini 5), Paqueta 6; Bowen 5, Scamacca 5 (Antonio 5).
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