Analysis: West Ham

For the visit of league leaders Chelsea, West Ham set up in a 4-1-4-1 system in possession, with Declan Rice holding between the defence and midfield. Andriy Yarmolenko and Felipe Anderson played as the wide attacking midfielders, while Mark Noble and Pedro Obiang would play centrally and in the half-spaces, trying to operate between Chelsea’s defensive and midfield lines.

With far inferior possession throughout, Manuel Pellegrini’s players spent very little time on the ball and in their in-possession structure. When they were building up, they tended to circulate the ball and look for opportunities to exploit the wide areas before delivering crosses in the box. Yarmolenko would occasionally play inside, allowing right-back Pablo Zabaleta to push forward – this positional movement was also seen with Arthur Masuaku and Anderson on the left, albeit less often.

The hosts’ key strategy was to allow Chelsea to have the ball for large periods and then look to hit them on the counter-attack. When they were breaking, the players were encouraged to keep the ball moving forwards quickly and to bring others into possession to assist with the build – very rarely did they stop to slow the game down.

They set up in a 4-1-4-1 mid-block out of possession, allowing for very simple transition from their in-possession structure. They were content to allow the visitors’ centre-backs to have possession, with lone forward Michail Antonio tasked with halving the size of the pitch by showing the centre-back on the ball towards the outside, discouraging the switch to the other centre-back. This made it easier for the rest of the team to slide across and prevent forward play.

When the ball was then moved to the full-back, the widest of the midfield four could push towards him and apply moderate pressure. Here, the key was to prevent anything from going through the middle – particularly to Eden Hazard, who was operating in these areas. When Hazard did get on the ball, he was swarmed by West Ham players from all angles.

The distances between West Ham’s individuals and units were very compact – rarely more than 30 yards from the back line to Antonio – which made it difficult for the visitors to break them down. The back four also demonstrated good discipline in not being pulled out of their slot to confront the movement of Hazard, who kept roaming into different areas to seek out an advantage. With the exception of one rotation with Olivier Giroud in the first half, Chelsea’s number 10 rarely got in behind the defence.

Denying Hazard any opportunity to influence play was crucial in the Hammers ending Chelsea’s winning start to the Premier League season. Pellegrini was tactically spot on for the visit of the Blues, and his side should really have taken the three points through Yarmolenko, whose second-half header fell wide of the post despite him having only the goalkeeper to beat.