All for one: West Ham's impressive team performance against Manchester United

 

West Ham United produced one of their best team performances of the season against Manchester United on Thursday evening.

The Hammers more than held their own against the Red Devils, holding Jose Mourinho’s side at arm’s length and restricting them to just two shots on target from inside the penalty area at London Stadium.

It says much about the collective nature of West Ham’s performance that no single player made more than three clearances – Aaron Cresswell, Declan Rice and Pablo Zabaleta all did so – and seven different players made interceptions, led by captain Mark Noble with five.

West Ham were compact, organised, tactically disciplined and worked their socks off, covering 2.4km more as a team than their opponents.

 

 

The Hammers’ performance was personified by 33-year-old Zabaleta at right wing-back, who covered 10.09km himself – only midfielders Noble, Manuel Lanzini, Joao Mario and Cheikhou Kouyate ran more – and made a team-high 67 sprints. To put that into context, Manchester United’s wing-backs Antonio Valencia and Luke Shaw each covered approximately 9.5km and made 49 sprints.

Even when Manchester United did breach the resilient West Ham rearguard, Adrian was at his agile best, making half-a-dozen saves to keep out efforts from Alexis Sanchez, Luke Shaw and Jesse Lingard.

Going forward, West Ham were also good in possession of the ball, with their pass completion percentage up 7% on their season average from 75.3% to 83.3% – the third-highest completion rate of the season behind the goalless draw at West Bromwich Albion and home defeat by Brighton & Hove Albion.

West Ham also completed 81.6% of their passes in the final third – normally the most difficult part of the pitch to keep the ball. Again, this was the third-highest completion rate of the campaign after the home draw with Leicester City and narrow away defeat at champions Manchester City.

Only four times this season have the Hammers attempted more than the 474 passes than they attempted on Thursday night.

Four West Ham players completed more than 90% of their passes, while three more completed more than 85%, including Noble and Lanzini.

Up front, Marko Arnautovic again carried West Ham’s biggest attacking threat, unleashing three of his team’s nine goal attempts, including the only one which seriously tested David De Gea – a first-half shot from inside the D.

When you consider West Ham were playing against a Manchester United team which has not dropped out of the Premier League’s top three all season, Thursday’s performance was one to be proud of.