How important was Andriy Yarmolenko’s winning goal for West Ham? Put it like this. There have been 48 points contested by the bottom five teams since Project Restart began and, when he scored, West Ham had earned as many as their four rivals put together.
Three. No, it’s not a lot. One win for West Ham, two draws for Aston Villa, and a draw for Watford. In what has been an increasingly desperate race to the bottom, however, it is huge. Fifteenth placed Brighton aside, West Ham are the first of the remaining relegation candidates to actually win a game – across 16 attempts.
And against Chelsea, no less; another milestone. The last time West Ham completed a league double over Chelsea was in the 2002-03 season. Paolo Di Canio scored the only goal in a win at Upton Park on May 3, 2003 – with Chelsea’s current managerial duo, Frank Lampard, and Jody Morris, on the other side. That summer a gentleman called Roman Abramovich arrived and it has never happened since. Until Wednesday night.
