West Ham United were comfortably beaten by Chelsea in the Premier League on Monday night.
Robert Huth has claimed that West Ham United duo Declan Rice and Mark Noble were given an ‘almost impossible’ task in trying to handle Chelsea’s midfield trio on Monday night.
Manuel Pellegrini’s side suffered a 2-0 defeat against their London rivals at Stamford Bridge, with Eden Hazard netting a brace, including a sublime solo goal in the first half.
During the break, Pellegrini made a tactical switch by bringing on Robert Snodgrass for Javier Hernandez, which helped the away team to control the game for a brief period before Hazard sealed the points late on.
Former Premier League winner Huth alluded to that change at half-time as he pointed out the difficult situation the usually reliable Noble and Rice found themselves in.
“West Ham will analyse their performance. Declan Rice and Mark Noble trying to handle that Chelsea midfield three was almost impossible. But they changed it at half time and were loads better,” Huth told BBC Sport.
Every time Hazard got on the ball it stuck to his feet like glue. The Hammers couldn’t get near him, bully him off the ball or stop him from causing havoc in the attacking third.
The positive Pellegrini and his players can take from the Chelsea defeat is that they met Hazard in fine form as he arguably produced his best performance of the season.
Nonetheless, the result leaves West Ham outside of the Premier League’s 10 and in a bad run of form, which has only seen them beat already-relegated Huddersfield in recent weeks.
It doesn’t get any easier for the East London club because at the weekend they will travel to Manchester to take on United at Old Trafford.
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