Bournemouth 1 West Ham 1
Match verdict by Hughie Southon
West Ham managed to shot themselves in the foot again with one of their ultra defensive performances after taking the lead via a brilliant Jarrod Bowen opener.
They had bossed the first half which made a pleasant change with the goal scorer on fire throughout and Tomas Soucek returning to the form that had made him a firm fans favourite during his first season.
Brilliant Bowen scores a fabulous goal
He was effective in both boxes and hit the crossbar as the Irons turned on the first half pressure. Lucas Paqueta was his inventive self and Pablo Fornals was in great form throughout.
Areola was a surprise choice in goal but made two or three decent saves to show that his time has come at last whilst captain Zouma was top man at the back.
Hammers dropped deeper and deeper
However, it all started to unravel in the second half as the Hammers decided to drop deeper and deeper which eventually led to the Bournemouth goal.
The collective decision to start defending for their lives presumably came from the boss but at least after that equaliser we went forward and created some good chances with Paqueta hitting an upright.
Sadly all that showed was that had there been a different mindset at work in the second half we could quite possibly have extended the lead and made the game safe.
Sadly, it has to be said that if this is how we will play against a team such as Bournemouth having gone in front, we have to fear the outcome of games against the top teams.
Still a point is a point but in means we haven’t won on opening day for goodness knows how many seasons and that defensive structure really is not good enough,
Same old, same old. Moyes ultra defensive tactics rear their ugly head yet again. We were looking good for 3 points after Bowen’s screamer of a goal finally put us ahead. But then you could see what was likely to happen as the Cherries stepped things up and we stepped things down. That is the David Moyes way. Let the opposition have possession and we’ll just try to hang on. No, don’t try to get a second goal, just sit back and defend. And so, the inevitable happened. Again. It means that some good team work was undone and 2 points needlessly thrown away. And, now that we have some tough games coming up, I fear we will rue our missed opportunity to make a good start to the season.