After so much incoherent murmuring, Chelsea are finally starting to make a little sense. Not enough to trust them, but enough for Mauricio Pochettino to articulate solid arguments in favor of continued employment beyond this summer.
As always, any talk of revivals must be weighed against the calamities that have followed each of their new dawns in this strangest of campaigns.
But there is also no doubt that Pochettino has orchestrated a reasonable recovery, with the victory over Tottenham now followed by this exuberant demolition of another London rival.
In what was their fourth victory in seven league games, Chelsea were excellent. There was no ambiguity around this nor any suggestion that this was a one-man effort.
Unlike several of his highlights this season, Cole Palmer wasn’t the only agent of destruction. Sure, he was brilliant, which goes beyond his last goal (the 21st of his wonderful campaign, plus nine assists), but here he had company. Here the load was shared. Here the quality turned and shone. Whisper it and then forget it, because less than a fortnight ago they were beaten 5-0 by Arsenal, but they looked a good team here.
Chelsea went on a rampage against West Ham to bolster their hopes of securing European football.
Mauricio Pochettino may have earned a second season in charge of Chelsea
It was a difficult afternoon for West Ham, who are now winless in their last six games.
Conor Gallagher was naturally among the best. Anyone inside that boardroom who sees pure profit in his actions should be expelled from west London: he is pure class and indispensable; a master at recovering the ball and one of the safest pairs of boots when in possession. His goal was very well executed.
Then there was Noni Madueke, who put in arguably her best performance of the season. He annihilated Emerson in the battle down Chelsea’s right flank, in which a sloppy goal was scored and a selfless assist provided to Nicolas Jackson, whose own season mirrors that of his club. This former lightning rod for Pochettino’s struggles impressed against Spurs and bagged two in this thrashing, adding momentum to Chelsea’s late push for European qualification.
Now this is the tricky part: how do you contextualise a hideout when the victim is as desperately poor as the one David Moyes served at Stamford Bridge? They were rotten. Without character. Coward. For what he has brought to West Ham, we could fairly say that his tenure deserved a more lively end, if these turn out to be his last few weeks at the club.
In that conversation, this performance disappointed him. Ashamed by his indifference. If Julen Lopetegui was watching, he might well have incurred some reservations about the character of a team that could draw with Liverpool and roll so smoothly next time.
This beatdown could be predicted almost immediately. Not necessarily through obvious chances, but the ease with which Chelsea retained possession and then won it back. West Ham’s complicity in all of this cannot be underestimated: their midfield was sadly up for grabs.
After his performance against Liverpool, we could have expected something much more solid. Moyes certainly did: he went for an unchanged side here, but it’s strange how the same cogs can have so much variation.
In four minutes we saw Moisés Caicedo charge 30 yards or more unopposed down the middle of the field. Presumably such liberties were not in the plan, although in this case the move failed on the edge of the West Ham area when Jackson missed his touch.
Cole Palmer pounced on a loose ball inside the area and put the hosts in front after just 15 minutes.
Palmer now sits second in the Premier League Golden Boot race with 21 goals.
Captain Conor Gallagher volleyed in on the half-hour mark to double his team’s lead.
The blues midfielder is pure class and indispensable, but uncertainty persists about his future
Noni Madueke added a third just minutes later to heap misery on the hapless Hammers.
A moment later, Emerson was dragged out of his position at left-back, giving space for Gallagher to fire a quick free-kick towards Jackson. Cutting down the right, he looked for a shot at the near post and Alphonse Areola made the save, but those two warnings illustrated what each coach was working on.
The result came just before the quarter-hour mark, although there was some luck for Chelsea, with Jackson receiving a cross from Madueke and crashing his volley against Kurt Zouma’s thigh. In the randomness of a bounce, the ball could have gone anywhere, but it chose Palmer and the inevitable followed: a beautifully precise strike into the corner.
For a brief moment, West Ham mustered some resilience, with Jarrod Bowen heading against the bar almost immediately after the restart, but it was a fight that was short-lived. In the following passages of the game, both Jackson and Madueke were able to advance unhindered through Moyes’ midfield to threatening scores before the second goal arrived in the 30th minute.
As with the first goal, there was some luck, and once again luck went against Zouma. This time he blocked a Madueke volley and it was Gallagher who attacked the loose ball.
Sensing a capitulation, Chelsea pushed for more and found it through Madueke. Tomas Soucek had set him free when a corner from Mykhailo Mudryk went over and he was in the right place to cross the line after Thiago Silva deflected the ball the other way.
Watching a replay on his monitor, Moyes had a look of disgust etched on his face: mistakes on set pieces always hurt him more.
The goal was Madueke’s eighth goal in all competitions for Chelsea this season.
West Ham had chances after the break, but Moyes’ men failed to take advantage.
Nicolas Jackson was on hand to further increase his team’s lead, scoring a double in the second half.
The defeat increases the pressure on David Moyes, whose future at the club seems uncertain
Both Gallagher and Bowen hit the opposition bars towards the end of the half, before Chelsea grabbed the second with another slap for their visitors.
Or rather, West Ham made a mistake. Full marks to Trevoh Chalobah for the 50-yard pass which Madueke kindly squared for Jackson to tap into, but Emerson’s tracking of the English winger on the initial pass was chaotic.
Jackson’s second had more difficulty, but he nailed the one-on-one with Areola after a ball through the middle from Caicedo. Naturally, it all started with a mistake by West Ham when Soucek miscontrolled, but Moyes could no longer gesture at that point.
If there was any relief for him it was that most of the West Ham fans had already gone home.
