West Ham Utd 1-2 Werder Bremen

  • by Staff Writer
  • Sunday, 2nd August 2015

West Ham's final pre-season friendly at the Boleyn Ground - ever - ended in defeat this afternoon, thanks to a brace from Bremen's Anthony Ujah.

Werder's number 21 struck twice in the first half to win the game for the visitors after Diafra Sakho had given the Hammers a 19th minute lead and with it, hope of retaining the Betway Cup.

But a gaffe from the usually-reliable Adrian allowed the visitors to level with 90 seconds, before the 24-year-old Nigerian grabbed a second on the half-hour mark to win the game for the Bundesliga outfit.



In front of a tiny crowd of less than ten thousand - with many dissuaded from attending by the 250 per cent ticket price rise on Thursday's Europa League clash with Astra - the Hammers opened strongly, with Dimitri Payet looking particularly threatening.

Therefore it was no surprise when Slaven Bilic's side opened the scoring following some good work on the right by the French international, who twisted and turned before feeding Diafra Sakho; the striker finding the bottom left corner of Wiedwald's net from the edge of the six yard box.

However the Hammers had barely finished celebrating Sakho's goal when Adrian uncharacteristically erred at the other end of the field, allowing a hopeful long-range drive from Ujah to slip under his body and find the back of the net.

There was worse to come for West Ham on 31 minutes when Ujah added his second of the day after the Hammers failed to clear their lines - not for the first time this week.

As the ball arrived back in their penalty area following a poor clearance, James Tomkins and Angelo Ogbonna were left flat-footed as the Nigerian turned on the edge of the area before firing across Adrian into the same corner in which he scored his first goal.

That proved enough to win the game for the visitors, although West Ham could consider themselves somewhat unfortunate to lose having probably been the better side overall. The Hammers were also unlucky not to be awarded a second half spot kick when Sakho appeared to be sent tumbling in the area, but referee Scott ignored the striker's pleas and waved play on.



* View all the goals from today's 2-1 defeat here.


West Ham Utd: Adrian (Spiegel 46), Tomkins, Kouyate (Maiga 63), Zarate (Cullen 63), Jenkinson (Collins 46), Sakho, Noble (Amalfitano 63), Ogbonna (Henry 63), Payet (Lanzini 46), Oxford (Poyet 46), Page (Knoyle 63).

Unused Subs: Lee, Howes, Nasha, Pask.

Booked: Poyet.

Goals: Sakho (19).

Werder Bremen: Wiedwald, Lukimya, Vestergaard, Fritz, Kroos (Frode 63), Garcia, Ujah, Bartels (Manneh 63), Grillitsch, Eggestein (Zander 63).

Unused Subs: Hajrovic, Pavlovic, Husing, Sternberg, Husic.

Goals: Ujah (20, 31).

Referee: Graham Scott.

Attendance: 9,919.

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