Jarrod Bowen struck a 59th-minute winner for West Ham to consign new Southampton head coach Ivan Juric to a 1-0 defeat in his first match in charge.
Former Torino boss Juric had watched Sunday’s goalless draw at Fulham from the stand to give renewed hope to the Premier League’s bottom club, but they suffered a 14th defeat of the campaign to remain eight points from safety.
It was not all good news for opposite number Julen Lopetegui after he watched Hammers’ goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski suffer a nasty first-half blow, which saw him leave the pitch on a stretcher after 36 minutes.
VAR was required at the start of the second period after Guido Rodriguez had a red card downgraded to a yellow before Bowen grabbed his sixth goal of the season to extend West Ham’s unbeaten run to four matches.
Juric’s first major call was to drop Saints starlet Tyler Dibling and hand only a second start of the season to forward Paul Onuachu.
West Ham welcomed back Carlos Soler but lost Lucas Paqueta to suspension, and the former almost put them ahead in the fourth minute.
Aaron Wan-Bissaka ended a lung-bursting run with a fine cross for Soler, who smashed the ball against the crossbar before Rodriguez’s follow-up strike was deflected away from goal.
It was a let-off for sluggish Southampton, but they quickly improved and Onuachu headed wide after Kyle Walker-Peters impressively kept in a cross by fellow wing-back Yuki Sugawara.
More fine play resulted in Adam Armstrong being able to pick out Mateus Fernandes, but his low header was saved by Fabianski.
West Ham’s Max Kilman was brought off soon after due to a shoulder issue before Fabianski thwarted Walker-Peters’ weak effort and then produced an even better save to deny Onuachu after 25 minutes.
Walker-Peters dug out a cross and Onuachu’s header back across goal was superbly clawed away by Fabianski, who unfortunately exited proceedings not long after.
Fabianski was caught late by Nathan Wood from a corner and after seven minutes of medical attention left the pitch to a standing ovation in the 36th minute.
The lengthy stoppage took the sting out of the contest until Wan-Bissaka volleyed wide after an excellent run by Mohammed Kudus and Onuachu then had another header saved deep into 10 minutes added on at the end of the first half.
Saints thought their cause was boosted in the 51st minute when Rodriguez was shown a red card.
He caught Walker-Peters late but a VAR check told referee Lewis Smith to review the incident on the pitchside monitor and he downgraded his original decision to a yellow card.
Things went from bad to worse for Southampton a minute before the hour mark as West Ham took the lead.
It started with a miscued pass by Sugawara gifting the Hammers a corner. After they kept the ball alive from the set-piece, a cross by Edson Alvarez was headed back across goal by Tomas Soucek and flicked on by Niclas Fullkrug, which allowed Bowen to poke home.
Sugawara was immediately hooked by Juric before Onuachu had soft penalty appeals waved away after a shove by Konstantinos Mavropanos.
Fernandes dragged wide for Saints shortly afterwards and Juric turned to Dibling with 17 minutes left.
Adam Lallana was also introduced but Dibling could only curl over from 20 yards in stoppage time as Southampton lost again.
Sourse: breakingnews.ie
