There goes the game plan: West Ham 3-0 Derby

Leading The Rams on their first trip to the London Stadium, it looked as though John Eustace had one plan in mind: keep it tight.

Facing West Ham was always going to be a tough task. Nuno Espirito Santo’s side possess two starting centre backs bought for a total of £60m, and the Championship’s most expensive import after they signed Celtic’s Belgian midfielder Arne Engels for £25m. Then there's Jarrod Bowen, who really should be playing European football this season. But unfortunately for Championship defenders, he has decided to stay put in East London, whether out of loyalty to The Irons, or his father-in-law.

While you can give Bowen credit for sticking by West Ham, the one thing you cannot afford to give him is space. But that is exactly what Derby did.

The Hammers took the lead inside six minutes. In acres of grass, he crossed deep to the back post where Taty Castellanos won the aerial duel against Ryan Nyambe, who was making his first Rams start in over a year.  The former Lazio man then simply had to head the ball back across goal for Joel Piroe to tap in after he shook off Sondre Langås.

Bubble burst. There went the game plan. While it worked well against a Portsmouth side that are among the relegation favourites, The Irons were always going to be more ruthless. Especially when presented with a chance from two yards which was worth 0.95 xG.

Bowen could have made it two in as many minutes when he was played in down the right following a fast break but could only poke his shot wide. Irons defenders Max Kilman and Konstantinos Mavropanos then both fired off target from free-kicks as the hosts pushed for a second. It looked like the travelling flock could be in for a long afternoon.

After a 20-minute onslaught in which Nuno’s men fired eight shots at the Derby goal, another blow for The Rams; Rhian Brewster was forced off in a 22^nd minute concussion substitution. At least it meant that David Ozoh’s Rams return came earlier than planned.

Eustace told BBC Radio Derby: “I thought he was top drawer, that’s why we brought him to the football club. You know, he’s a top player, I thought Dave was excellent today.”

Jacob Widell Zetterström was forced to make two top saves as the half hour mark approached. First, he denied Bowen after the winger cut inside past Charlie Taylor with a fabulous piece of skill. Then he palmed another Mavropanos header, from the resulting corner, away from point-blank range.

Having settled into the game, Ozoh showed his class in the build-up to Derby’s only chance of the first half. After dropping into the backline to receive the ball, he drove forward to a soundtrack of “du, du, du, du, David Ozoh!”. Though he failed to find Oscar Fraulo, who was now in the number 10 role, the former Crystal Palace man promptly won the ball back and found Alex Mowatt.

His speculative 20-yard effort flew well wide, though.

Eustace admitted: “We wanted to impose ourselves more than what we wanted in the first half.”

And that summed up Derby’s afternoon, as they failed to hit the target from any of there five attempts. “I’m disappointed that we didn’t really create any clear-cut chances, but I think there’s a lot in that second half that we can take away from today,” Eustace said.

Despite increasing their control and territory in the second half, the visitors failed to fashion any real opportunities. West Ham season ticket holder and Rams attacker Sam Szmodics probably found himself in the best position to score, but 10 yards out in the inside right, he failed to get his shot away as he went down in the box.

There were nervy moments when Bowen broke from a Derby corner, only for Manor Solomon to fire straight at Zetterström. The number made some strong stops throughout the afternoon but played his team into trouble when he rolled the ball out looking for Alex Mowatt, who was surrounded by a claret and blue high press.

Mo Fuseini was a bright spark when he came on, showing his electric pace to recover the ball for Max Johnston after his former Sturm Graz teammate was wrong-footed by a pass out from the back. And he also won a central free-kick 25 yards from goal which Lars-Jørgen Salvesen hit through the wall and wide.

Derby opened the game up in the final ten minutes, becoming more aggressive as they hunted for an equaliser. But they were punished by Norwegian winger Edvin Austbø.

Left unmarked with Max Johnston in two minds over whether to come across to mark Bowen, the former Viking man turned into the bottom-left corner from six yards out after Dion Sanderson blocked the hosts’ skipper’s initial shot. And in a final Hammer blow, Austbø was able to thread a pass to Mohamadou Kanté, who rifled home a third with the last kick of the game.

 

Did the scoreline flatter the hosts?

Whether with Rams TV, BBC Radio Derby or others, a repeated theme of Eustace’s post-match interviews was that the scoreline flattered West Ham. In a sense it did, with the final two goals coming when the state of the game had changed dramatically. Derby had to throw caution to the wind in search of an equaliser, so were always going to be more vulnerable.

Consider too that Wolves shipped four to Nuno’s men in the week. This is a strong side, who will be right up there. Even Charlton, who caught everyone’s attention with their victory at the London Stadium two weeks ago were dominated in every metric, bar the crucial one – the scoreline.

Whether Eustace’s set-up was too defensive, or the players simply struggled to gel in attack, this was a game few expected Derby to win. West Ham will likely have even bigger margins of victory as the season goes on.

Debutants

Within 15 minutes, David Ozoh had already shown why The Rams had pursued him all summer. He’s pure class on the ball and adds steel off it. The number four misplaced just one of his 31 passes in 68 minutes – he is one of few who really comes out of this game with credit.

Fellow deadline day addition Mo Fuseini demonstrated what he will bring to the side too. Bags of pace and energy. Although you have to sympathise with the Ghanaian, coming on in a game where his new side have created next to nothing and struggled to keep the ball in the final third, it is not hard to see he only had five touches – and two of them were in the defensive half.

Henrik Meister will want to improve on his Rams bow too. While he put himself about up front, he was isolated and therefore struggled to display the power that he possesses. Eustace said: “He worked hard, his attitude was good. There’s still a lot more to come from him, I’m sure.”

Meanwhile, Eiran Cashin was unable to make his debut in East London, having been struggling with his ankle for the last couple of weeks. Though Eustace sounded hopeful that he will be able to join the group in what will be a very busy week ahead with West Brom and Birmingham to come at Pride Park.

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West Ham (4-4-2): Hermansen (GK); Veltman, Mavropanos, Kilman, Scarles (Boiro 77’); Bowen (C) (Morato 90’), Mukasa (Kanté 90’), Engels, Solomon (Austbø 77’); Castellanos (Orford 64’), Piroe.

Unused substitutes: Herrick (GK); Golambeckis, Walker-Peters; Lamadrid.

Derby (4-2-3-1: Zetterström (GK); Nyambe (Johnston 71’), Langås (C), Sanderson, Taylor; Fraulo (Clark 62’), Mowatt (Blackett-Taylor 86’); Hedges (Fuseini 71’), Szmodics, Brewster (Ozoh 22’); Meister (Salvesen 62’).

Unused substitutes: Vickers (GK); Ward, Offor.