David Moyes and Declan Rice were both left furious and accused Chelsea goalkeeper Edouard Mendy of ‘faking’ a shoulder injury after a controversial late VAR decision saw West Ham leave Stamford Bridge empty-handed.
The Hammers found themselves 2-1 behind heading into the closing stages of the game in West London but thought they had snatched a valuable point through Maxwel Cornet’s first goal since his summer switch from Burnley. The Ivorian had smashed home after collecting the ball from a poor claim from Blues stopper Mendy.
However, their celebrations were cut short as VAR chalked the goal off due to a foul on the Chelsea man by Jarrod Bowen - a decision that has left the vast majority of spectators baffled.
Moyes in particular was left particularly furious with the call, the Hammers boss going as far as accusing Mendy of simulating an injury following a slight brush from Bowen.
Asked about the incident in his post-match press conference, the Scot replied: "Well have you seen it?! The goalkeeper comes out and fumbles... then acts as if it's a shoulder injury! I thought 'there's no way he's overturning this'... it was a ridiculously bad decision. I'd question VAR today as much as the referee.
"The sad thing is this is the level of our elite refereeing at the moment. The goalkeeper tried to fake an injury on our first goal as well. So he's done the same on the second goal."
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Moyes isn’t the only one to have taken exception to the incident. Speaking after the final whistle at Stamford Bridge, Hammers captain Declan Rice also hit out at the decision having been left confused as to why the touch from Bowen was worthy of being labelled a foul.
Speaking to Match of the Day, the England midfielder said: “It’s gutting. Obviously the main talking point is the disallowed goal. We’ve obviously just looked back on it then as a team and I can’t say too much because I don’t want to get fined but how can you go over to the monitor and call that a foul?
“It’s an absolute disgrace. The lads and the manager is gutted. We felt like we could have come away with something, that’s the summary of it.”
The decision will wrangle even more so with the Hammers as it sees them continue their poor start to the new season. They have been left with just one win from their opening six games and sit in the bottom three alongside Nottingham Forest and Leicester City.
In the meantime, Chelsea move up to fifth with the controversial victory and Blues boss Thomas Tuchel somewhat unsurprisingly agreed with the VAR call.
Speaking after the game, the German said: “It went in our favour and there's a reason it went in our favour. In my opinion, it is a foul. I will not comment anymore but what happened against Tottenham was so obvious and I paid a lot of money for commenting, so I will not do it.”
