English Premier League leaders Chelsea continued to exert their dominance in the title race with a 2-1 win over West Ham United at the London Stadium on Monday. With the win, the Blues restored their 10 point advantage at the top with 11 games remaining.

Eden Hazard opened the scoring for the away side against the run of play in the first half. The Belgian’s incisiveness in the penalty box proved to be too much to handle for the Hammers. Striker Diego Costa scored Chelsea’s second and his 18th league goal from close range in the second, thus setting up the win.

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West Ham, who were outplayed on the other side of the break, pulled one back with a powerful strike by Manuel Lanzini deep into stoppage time – it was too late to stage a comeback.

West Ham were comfortable with the ball at their feet in the early stages of the first half. Like they have done for much of the season, Antonio Conte’s side got the opening goal of the game through a devastating counter-attack. Hazard made no mistake after being put through on goal by Pedro, and calmly rounded keeper Darren Randolph to slot in the opener.

Costa’s strike came five minutes into the second half with the West Ham defence going to sleep from a Cesc Fabregas corner. The last hour of the game saw little attacks of note from either side. The East London side also failed to captilalise on Andy Carroll’s ability with headers with their crosses and long-balls lacking the ability to threaten the Chelsea defence.

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Just as the game crawled to the finish line, West Ham sprang to life with a well-taken goal from Lanzini, who was set up by a powerful run through the middle from Andre Ayew. The Argentinian struck low and hard past Thibaut Courtois’s reach. The result, though, was never in doubt once the first goal went in.

Chelsea are at 66 points and have now scored the second highest number of goals in the division with 57, one less than Liverpool. West Ham failed to get into the top half of the table and lie at 11th place with 33 points.

Brief score:

  • West Ham United 1 (Manuel Lanzini) lose to Chelsea 2 (Eden Hazard, Diego Costa)