Nobody could accuse David Moyes of failing to lay on enough entertainment during this 4-2 win for West Ham. Only Brentford, perched five points above the bottom three after their fifth defeat in six games, wanted to look elsewhere. Thomas Frank will be focusing less on West Ham’s creative mojo returning and more on his defence’s meek attempt to deal with Jarrod Bowen hunting down his first hat-trick in claret and blue.
It promises to be a nervous few months if Brentford, who face Arsenal and Chelsea next, continue to ship goals at such an alarming rate. Although Ivan Toney’s brio in attack kept alive hopes of an unlikely comeback, the worries at the other end felt overwhelming long before full time. West Ham, who delighted in ending a slump that had revived complaints about Moyes’s style of play, could not have asked for more obliging opponents.
