Into Europe With A Win

May 23, 2021 at 8:31 pm Leave a comment

There will be European football at the Hammers’ home next season, as West Ham ended a memorable, unique 2020/21 season with a 3-0 win over Southampton in front of 10,000 jubilant supporters at London Stadium that secured sixth place, their highest league position in 22 years.

^{David Moyes: “Make sure you’re all vaccinated and get your passports out because we’re going to Europe.”}

The Irons also secured a record Premier League points total with 65, a record number of victories with 19 – including a record nine away wins – and finished in the top six of the top tier for just the sixth time in the Club’s 126-year history.

Saturday’s win was a microcosm of the campaign, with West Ham showing resilience to stay on level terms early before showing their quality as Pablo Fornals netted a quickfire brace before Declan Rice fittingly capped a season ending win with a superb solo goal late on.

This was the same result as two years ago when West Ham, then managed by Manuel Pellegrini, also beat the Saints 3:0 thanks to a brace from Marko Arnautovic and a Ryan Fredericks goal. The biggest difference was the number of spectators in the London Stadium: 60,000 were present in May 2019, and I was one of them! This time only 10,000 supporters were allowed back into the ground (cf. pics below).