Liverpool Ends West Ham's Positive Trend, Wins 3-1 Then Shakes 3rd Position
JAKARTA - Liverpool hit the top three of the Premier League standings after ending West Ham United's positive trend by smothering the hosts 3-1 in Week 21 of the Premier League at the London Olympic Stadium, Sunday local time (Monday WIB).
The victory, which was supported by Mohamed Salah's brace and Georginio Wijnaldum's goal, made Liverpool move up to third in the standings with a collection of 40 points, overtaking Leicester City (39) who lost the match earlier.
Meanwhile, West Ham (35), who had to be willing to put up a series of six games without losing, four consecutive wins and four home games, they ended up being stuck in fifth place, quoted Antara from the official Premier League website.
Juergen Klopp, who played without a single senior center-back following Joel Matip's injury, had additional problems as Sadio Mane was injured and was not even included in the squad for the match against West Ham.
Mane's absence was felt on the Liverpool front lines, which seemed to have lost the attack option when Klopp also chose to rest Roberto Firmino in order to give Divock Origi and Xherdan Shaqiri a chance.
The first half passed almost without significant opportunities from either side, although Liverpool seemed more confident in dominating possession.
An important decision was made by Klopp in the 57th minute when he pulled out James Milner to be replaced by Curtis Jones, who had seen Milner ask for an explanation from the manager.
The move proved to be effective because after just a few seconds of grazing, Jones recorded an assist when his pass was controlled and completed perfectly by Salah to open Liverpool's lead over West Ham.
One goal down gave West Ham the ambition to retaliate, but they fell victim to the construction of a clinical counter-attack from Liverpool that doubled their lead in the 68th minute.
Starting from a West Ham corner that was intercepted by Andy Robertson, Trent Alexander-Arnold sent a deep cross towards Shaqiri who immediately passed it into the middle of the penalty box where Salah stood free enough to beat goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski in a one-on-one situation.
Immediately after the goal, Shaqiri was pulled out for Firmino, who would later play an important role again for Liverpool's third goal in the 84th minute.
Starting from a one-two pass collaboration with Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Firmino thrust a mature ball towards Wijnaldum, who only left it in the mouth of the goal to increase Liverpool's 3-0 lead over the host.
Three minutes later, West Ham responded with a close-range shot from Craig Dawson who took advantage of a corner, but the goal was only a consolation as time was too short for the Hammers to avoid a 1-3 defeat to Liverpool.
The two teams are scheduled to return to action on Wednesday, February 3 when West Ham travel to Aston Villa headquarters while Liverpool host Brighton & Hove Albion at Anfield in an attempt to continue their revival trend.