Leicester’s problems at the bottom end of the table deepened as West Ham cruised to a 2-0 victory against Ruud van Nistelrooy’s side at the London Stadium.
Van Nistelrooy was looking for a response from his side from their 4-0 defeat at the hands of Brentford last time out but what he got was a lacklustre performance as they crashed to an 11th league defeat in 12 to stay rooted in the bottom three.
West Ham, who followed up victory at Arsenal at the weekend with another three points, didn’t get out of first gear. They didn’t need to.
They went ahead when Aaron Cresswell’s powerful strike was followed in by Mohammed Kudus, who saw his effort saved superbly by Mads Hermansen, but Tomas Soucek was alert to poke home the second rebound.
The defending left plenty to be desired and again they were undone just before the break. Jamie Vardy failed to deal with a corner at the near post before the ball fell kindly for Jarrod Bowen, who squeezed the ball home from the tightest of angles via a deflection off Jannick Vestergaard.
The second half was much like the first, very much lacking in spark.
Tomas Soucek celebrates opening the scoring for West Ham against Leicester
Leicester had a brief 10 minutes where they finally showed some urgency after Harry Winks and Stephy Mavididi were introduced, but it was all too brief from a Leicester point of view.
West Ham themselves appeared just to be playing for time as the game fizzled out, but they did create one final chance for Evan Ferguson, but the on-loan striker fluffed his lines when presented with a golden chance to grab his first Hammers goal.
The win sees West Ham move 16 points ahead of the relegation zone, but Leicester remain in deep trouble. They remain five points behind 17th-placed Wolves with 11 games remaining.
Time is starting to run out for Van Nistelrooy, and fast.
Things don’t get any easier for Leicester…
In his 14 games in charge at Leicester, Van Nistelrooy has picked up just seven points, three fewer than previous Foxes boss Steve Cooper managed this season with 10 in 12 games.
Things don’t get any easier for the Foxes in their next six games.
They have Chelsea, Man Utd, Man City, Newcastle, Brighton and Liverpool coming up.
If there’s no shift in results soon and Wolves pick up some positive results, Leicester’s fate could be sealed.
Van Nistelrooy: We will keep fighting
Van Nistelrooy was critical of his side’s first-half performance in east London but vowed to keep fighting right until the end in Leicester’s bid to escape the drop.
“The difference between the first and second half [was big],” he said. “The whole first half we were going back instead of putting our opponents under pressure.
“We don’t have too many results. Also in bottom three. We were too passive and too secure in our defensive organisation. We didn’t press the opponent at all. The backline was too deep, the midfield too.
“The second half you have a totally different game but you’ve conceded two.
“Nothing at all [changed tactically at half-time]. The intensity of the players. Forwards pressing. The higher back line and midfielders following on the pressure of the forwards.
“That is the way forward literally.
“When you are passive and hope the opponent doesn’t score, you call it upon yourself. The easy goals we conceded are a part of it.
“We are still in this fight. We’re mathematically there. We will keep fighting as long as we can.
“It must be clear the fight was only one half today and that’s not enough.”
Potter: More to come from West Ham
Victory saw West Ham win consecutive Premier League games for the first time since February/March 2024, courtesy of wins against Brentford and Everton.
It is also the first time they have won at the London Stadium without conceding for the first time since December 2023 against Manchester United.
Hammers boss Graham Potter believes there is still plenty more to come from his side.
He said: “Feels good. It’s not easy. The turnaround from the Arsenal game was not that long. Two efforts in five days is big for us. Two clean sheets, six points, delighted.
“The clean sheet was important. We have conceded too many goals this season. It’s important to stem that. The collective effort to do that was important.
“We controlled the first half and limited them. Overall we’re delighted. A big win for us.”
“Delighted for the players,” he added. “They have been working really hard. Now they have two wins back-to-back which isn’t easy in the Premier League.
“There is a lot of potential for sure. Talent is one thing. The foundations have to be good. Hopefully they are getting rewards because talent isn’t enough in this league. You have to keep clean sheets, defend well, do the ugly side of the game well and the players have done that and got their rewards.”
Soucek: We needed to show consistency
Meanwhile, goal scorer Soucek insisted it was an important win for West Ham as they followed up the win over Arsenal at the weekend in style.
He said: “It was really important because we knew we played very well at Arsenal away but we need to have this consistency, we wanted to win for our fans at home because the spirits can go up and we just need to build on this result. I am so happy.”
“I think in these last two games what we showed we showed, good spirit, good team effort.
“I could see in the first half it was a very good performance, in the second we did a few mistakes but still we won 2-0 and it was a great result. I think that even this can help our manager believe in what we’re doing and we are all so grateful for him.
“We know that the season is tough, this season we just want to stay as high as possible. We know we can challenge some big teams. Manchester United, Tottenham are around us. Even for West Ham fans it’s a big derby with Tottenham so we want to be better than them.”
