Crystal Palace took all three points from their derby match against West Ham at the London Stadium on Saturday as a late Jordan Ayew strike sealed a 2-1 win.
The Croydon outfit headed East in the city to face rivals West Ham who, prior to this game, sat above them in the Premier League table by just one point.
However, two second half goals from Palace means that they jump into 6th position, whilst West Ham’s seven game unbeaten run comes to an end.
The match was closely contested throughout but it was West Ham who took the lead on the 54th minute after excellent build-up play was finished off with a low cross into the box from Ryan Fredericks which summer signing, Sebastian Haller, poked into the net.
Since signing from Eintracht Frankfurt in July for a club-record of £45 million, his goal against Crystal Palace takes his tally to four goals for the season.
However, it didn’t take long for the Eagles to claw back into the match when right-back Patrick Van Aanholt unleased a thunderous penalty, sending the helpless West Ham goalkeeper Roberto in the wrong direction.
The penalty came in the 63rd minute after Declan Rice’s arm blocked the ball in the area.
That is Van Aanholt’s 12th goal for Palace since his debut in 2017; no other Premier League defender has scored more than him in that time.
As the game headed towards full-time, it seemed that there would be a share of the spoils, but the South Londoners had other ideas. The away fans erupted into celebration as French striker Jordan Ayew latched onto a pass in the box and side-footed the ball perfectly into Roberto’s goal.
The celebrations were put on hold for some time as the referee called for a VAR check for a potential offside.
But to heap unwanted misery onto the home team, and send the Palace fans into great excitement, the goal was allowed to stand. That was Ayew’s third goal in six appearances this season.
The result means that Crystal Palace leapfrog West Ham into 6th position on 14 points after 8 matches, with West Ham sliding down to 8th in the table on 12 points.
Both managers can take positives from the game, with Roy Hodgson feeling that despite the two goals that his team scored, it is the players at the back which are proving crucial.
The Crystal Palace manager told BBC Sport: “The one area we’ve been constantly strong in is central defence, but we’ve been working on our attacking play as well. That’s why we’ve managed to amass a good tally of points so far.”
After the international break, Crystal Palace will host Man City, as West Ham travel to Everton.
VAR strikes late! To take 5 minutes to make a decision there must have been a lot of doubt which way it should go and in that case the doubt should go with the defence.