West Ham 5-3 Burnley

By: Martin | November 28th, 2009

Five goals. Really, I would have been satisfied with a two, but perhaps it was better that it was five considering that within the last twenty-five minutes the Hammers conceded three. Come on guys, I don’t need the stress.

But it looked good early on. After seventeen minutes, Scott Parker, who seems to be much improved this season, slotted his free kick to Jack Collison who beat the Burnley goalkeeper. Guillermo Franco is settling into premier league and his presence was left by the Burnley defense constantly in the first half.

But it was youngster Junior Stanislas who put the Hammers two up after thirty-two minutes. Guillermo Franco showed his obvious skills with a great pass that beat the Burnley offside trap to reach Stanislas who had his first effort pushed back to him, but made no mistake with the rebound.

Hammers fans everywhere must have felt that Christmas had come early when the Burnley defense failed to deal with the advancing Jonathan Spector. The referee had no problems pointing the stop which allowed Carlton Cole to score his seventh of the season. But due to an earlier collision with the Burnley goalkeeper, Cole was having issues with his knee and had to be replaced by Zavron Hines at half-time.

It only took five minutes of the second half for the Hammers to be four up. Hines was fouled outside the area and Stanislas’ free-kick found the head of Guillermo Franco to increase his tally for the season. Luis Jimenez came on for Guillermo Franco seven minutes later and this lead quickly to goal number five.

It was Scott Parker again who dominated the midfield and fired a perfect pass through the Burnley defense to Jimenez who was hacked down by the Burnley goalkeeper. Not to be denied his goal, Jimenez slotted home the penalty and it was five-nil. And there it should have stayed. But like the draws recently against Sunderland and Hull, the Hammers gave up needless goals. Fortunately with a five goal headstart, Burnley was never going to catch up in the final twenty-five minutes, but they surely tried. Burnley got one back in the 67th minute and a second in the 73rd, but it wasn’t their day. After Burnley’s Steven Caldwell was sent off in injury time, the Clarets got a third, but the Hammers got the three points.
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