Sky Sports pundits stunned by ‘extremely naughty’ incident in West Ham United vs Bournemouth
Jefferson Lerma escaping a second yellow card for a lunge on West Ham striker Gianluca Scamacca stunned Martin Tyler and Efan Ekoku.
In the 56th-minute of the 2-0 Hammers win at the London Stadium the Cherries midfielder, already on a booking, stretched to challenge the Italian striker and caught him with his studs, but VAR did not get involved after David Coote simply blew for a foul.
Gary O’Neil was furious that the video assistant didn’t disallow Kurt Zouma’s opener for a handball against Thilo Kehrer in the first half, and also helped award the penalty that Said Benrahma added late on, but his side got away with one with Lerma, leaving Tyler and Ekoku, who also work on Sky Sports, highly surprised.
Speaking live on the world feed match commentary on Monday night (24 October, 9.10pm) Tyler reacted to a replay of the incident with: “Wow, on second look it was extremely naughty.”
An incredulous Ekoku then added: “They’ve looked at that and deemed it not worthy of a second or a third look.
“I’m not one for going to VAR but I am amazed they’ve not given that a 2nd or a 3rd look.”
Scythed
It was a decent result for the Irons on the night but was aided by a charitable call on the opening goal, which saw O’Neil booked for swearing at the referee at half-time, before remonstrating with him again at full time.
He easily could have seen his side go down to 10 men and it was strange on a night where Mike Dean was so heavily involved as the video assistant that he didn’t get involved in the foul.
Thankfully for David Moyes it didn’t appear to do lasting damage to Scamacca as the summer signing from Sassuolo has become a crucial part of the West Ham line up.
So while the visitors were probably hard done by with the opening goal on a decision that will get the most attention, they also got the benefit of the doubt on a less-heralded incident.
The result takes the Hammers into the top half of the Premier League, far later than everyone would have expected before the start of the season.
So it is another step in the right direction as Moyes overcomes a difficult start to head towards where has become customary for this team under his guidance.