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Hammers fans often scoff at the success of Chelsea and Manchester City, citing the only reason those teams do well is the extraordinary amount of money they have access to in order to blow other clubs out of the water in their transfer dealings. That may well be the case, however neither team seemed to have spent as much time at Drama school as either Manchester United or Liverpool, with the former being the most active Thespians of a bad bunch.

Well, who'd have thought that? Many people, including ourselves, didn't give Hammers a prayer for tonight's game against Manchester United at a packed Old Trafford. Hammers 'glorified' B team, as Mark Noble described it in his post match presser, was totally outclassed by that of Utd's on paper, but as the old saying goes "football is not played on paper, it is played on the field" and so it proved.

Man U: Henderson, Dalot, Lindelof, Bailly, Telles, Matic, Van de Beek, Sancho, Mata, Lingard, Martial Subs: Heaton, Wan-Bissaka, Jones, McTominay, Fernandes, Elanga, Greenwood
West Ham: Areola, Fredericks, Johnson, Diop, Dawson, Masuaku, Kral, Noble, Lanzini, Yarmolenko, Bowen Subs: Randolph, Coufal, Zouma, Ogbonna, Fornals, Vlasic, Benrahma.

Having trod nearly every Declan Rice to 'name your club' path available and exhausted every aspect of his contract negotiations to the max, the football press and media have changed tack and are now focusing on Jarrod Bowen instead. Suddenly the Hammers left footed forward has become the subject of intense scrutiny, with speculation rife that this organisation and that are 'seriously interested' in bringing the 24 year old to their clubs, Tottingham and Liverpool are among his current suitors according to those 'in the know'.

West Ham and long serving centre back Winston Reid have reached an agreement to terminate the players contract with the club, with over two years remaining of what was a SIX year deal something had to be done. Reid had been handed such a lengthy deal in order to fend of genuine interest from a host of clubs, including neighbours Arsenal.

This is what we have been told by a previously reliable source, Antonio's absence from the game against Manchester United meant the difference between the two teams, there is every possibility had he played that he would have 'feasted' on what could have become an extremely porous defence for the visitors.

Hammers matched their more wealthy and illustrious visitors for pace and determination, before losing out narrowly through 'THAT PEN' miss on Sunday. Bruised and battered, no one with one obvious exception, had anything left in the tank at the end of the game, so to go again against the same opponents, so soon after the match is going to require a team reset.

Normally most post match articles contain a player rating of some sort, however the post match analysis of West Ham players who featured in the game against Manchester United might concentrate on how knackered they were. By the end of the game even Pablo Fornals, who usually makes a Duracell bunny look lethargic, was on his knees and breathing through his proverbial.

Just five minutes before Jesse Lingard scored what proved to be the winning goal at the London Bowl, Hammers manager David Moyes was seen to be going apoplectic in his assessment of how Andriy Yarmolenko had been performing having come on to replace Nikola Vlasic in the 62nd minute, the Iron's manager could be seen screaming at the front man.

It was very difficult to write an unemotional and balanced review of yesterday's game against while on the way back from the match, it was even harder having got back and having to read and see the 'dissection' of what had been a thoroughly entertaining game, for the NEUTRAL and for Manchester United fans from all over the land who never have and never will visit the cess pit that is urban Manchester.