ANZOWLS Match report
FA Premier League - Sunday 21st November 1999, from Upton Park
V    
Result
West Ham United  3 Sheffield Wednesday

Wanchope 28
Di Canio 62 (pen)
Foe 70
Lampard 76
Rudi 38
Jonk 48
Booth 66

Att: 23,015



Teams
Hislop Pressman
J.Cole Nolan
Ruddock Hinchcliffe
R.Ferdinand Walker
Potts Atherton
Sinclair Alexandersson
Lampard Jonk
Keller Sonner
Foe Rudi
Di Canio de Bilde
Wanchope Booth

Subs
Subs


Cresswell- Rudi (81 mins)
Thome- Nolan (83 mins)

Un-used Subs
Un-used Subs


Forrest Srnicek
Moncur Briscoe
Charles Sibon
Minto
Omoyinmi


Match Report


Hammers comeback causes Wednesday heartbreak

A fiercly battled game with seven goals, end to end action and a sending off - Sky Sports viewers couldn't have wished for more. But once again lady luck wasn't on Wednesday's side as they lost a 3-2 lead to as West Ham came back to win 4-3.
The Owls remain rock bottom of the league but must take heart from the performance, and the fact that they scored their first away goals of the season. The only other coming from a Bradford own goal earlier back in August.

Both sides wasted opening chances - Petter Rudi was Wednesday's culprit with a shot that somehow missed, and Paolo Wanchope's close range header was disallowed for offside. After 28 minutes the Hammers did open the scoring. After some scrappy defending the ball fell to Wanchope whose header found the back of the net again and this time it counted.

Just ten minutes later Wednesday were back level as some good work by Gilles de Bilde ended up with Petter Rudi firing in the ball in from the edge of the Hammer's penalty area. West Ham fought back and the Owls had keeper Kevin Pressman to thank in the first half for some fines saves that kept the scores tied at 1-1 going into the break.

Half-time West Ham 1-1 Owls

Straight after the break Wednesday regained the lead as some de Bilde seemed to have knocked the ball too far, before somehow squeezing in a great cross for an unmarked Wim Jonk to side-foot volley home. The goal certainly meant a lot to the players, and indeed manager Danny Wilson who showed his jubilation from the touchline.

With just under half an hour to go the game was turned on it's head by some extremely questionable decisions by referee Alan Wilkie. First of all he judged Jonk to have brought down Trevor Sinclair in the box, when the replay clearly showed there was no contact. Former Owls man and West Ham skipper for the day Paolo Di Canio tucked the spotkick away and brought it back to 2-2.

The Hammers were level for only a few moments as once again Wednesday showed true battling spirits to regain their lead. Some fine work on the left hand side of the field by Andy Hinchcliffe saw Andy Booth fire in a rocket header at near post to make it 3-2.

There were to be further twists in the plot of the game - when referee Wilkie sent-off midfielder Danny Sonner after a challenge with Di Canio. After a second look, there was no doubt that the Italian had over acted the incident and had inticed the man in charge to show the red. To rub salt in the Wednesday wound - West Ham were level again just 30 seconds later when Marc Vivien Foe fired in following the free-kick from the sending off.

The Hammers' comeback was complete five minutes later as Frank Lampard was allowed to run and his shot beat Pressman inside his near post. It was asking too much for the Owls to come back once more and West Ham came close to extending their lead with some dodgy defending and clumsy goalkeeping in the Owls' backline. The full time whistle blew and Wednesday had been left with nothing to show for a fully committed effort, and they remain bottom with just six points.


AnzOwls player ratings:

Pressman - 7 Excellent first half but second half was at fault on more than one occasion. Still showed flashes of the keeper we all know he can be.
Nolan - 7 Solid game - made good runs down the right hand side too and looked good in attack.
Hinchcliffe - 6.5 Looked better going forward, sometimes a bit dodgy at the back. Didn't attempt to challenge Wanchope for West Ham's first goal and was partly to blame there.
Atherton - 6.5 Fairly good at the back, but sometimes was at sixes and sevens. A bit of a rock in Wednesday's defence.
Walker - 7 Consistent as ever - always 100% given by Des as usual and did a good job.
Alexandersson - 6.5 At times looked one of the better players on the field, but faded in and out of the game and things never really got going for him.
Jonk - 8.5 His creativity was a blessing for Wednesday when in attack - gave the midfield good shape and scored a fine goal.
Rudi - 7 After missing an absolute sitter early on he hit back with a great goal. Had a decent game but tended to give the ball away a bit too much. Like Alexandersson looked class at times.
Booth - 6.5 After a very quiet first half Boothy gave it all in the second half and scored a bullet header.
de Bilde - 7 Didn't get a clear cut chance infront of goal for the entire 90 minutes but still played a big part in Wednesday's game.
Cresswell (sub) - 6 Didn't get chance to do much but crunched Di Canio in a tackle (just a shame he didn't break the bastard's legs).
Thome (sub) - 6 Came on with only a few minutes left and didn't have any impact on the game whatsoever.