Time and again in recent weeks, David Moyes has called on his understudies to fill West Ham’s attacking void. Time and again, those calls have fallen on deaf ears.
And so, once his fury over the most chaotic of finales - one that included a pair of late red cards and spot-kicks converted at either end - subsides, he may take some solace from the first indications in months that his squad might yet be defined by something other than a polarised split between trusted starters and damaged goods.
