A 0-2 win for Brentford at London Stadium extended their unbeaten league streak to five games. Last night's defeat also prolonged West Ham's ongoing losing run to the same total.
The hosts started off the evening kick-off fairly positively. Ivan Toney's opener, on 18 minutes, could have been considered slightly against the run of the early play. The forward pounced on the rebound, after a volley from Christian Norgaard was parried towards him, to open the scoring.
Just prior to half-time, a long pass from Toney in-behind the West Ham backline gave Josh Dasilva the chance to take on Aaron Cresswell for pace. The Brentford man breezed past the full-back and had the time to coolly slot the ball into the bottom corner, with his first touch.
The Bees were able to see out the majority of the second half with relative comfort. It was not until the last few minutes of the game, that West Ham were able to create any real attacking momentum. A very well-deserved away win for Brentford.
Here are some of the main talking points, following last night's fixture:
Steady backline begins to falter for West Ham
Even throughout The Hammers' poor start to the 2022/23 Premier League campaign, their defensive record had been a fairly impressive one.
From West Ham's first 13 league games, they had conceded an average of one goal per game. Maintaining that record during their four subsequent fixtures would have had them as the third best defence in the league, in terms of goals conceded per game.
Instead, since then, they have gone on to let in at least two goals in each of those - a total of nine goals against.
Three of those four fixtures had been at home, with none of them being against any of the league's 'top six'. Crystal Palace, Leicester and, now, Brentford have all come and won at the London Stadium, with an aggregate score of 6-1.
That is not to say that things are looking a lot more promising for West Ham at the other end of the pitch - only three teams have scored fewer than their total of 13 goals, this campaign. However, this does show that even the few relative positives that The Hammers have had from this season, are now beginning to disappear.
The current injuries to Kurt Zouma and Nayef Aguerd are significant losses for West Ham. However, given the team's current disjointedness, there is no confidence in suggesting that the two post-World Cup fixtures would have gone much better, even with the presence of the duo.
Moyes' alterations could not yield the positive outcome
For the first time this season, there was no Tomas Soucek in the West Ham starting 11, for a Premier League game. David Moyes started Declan Rice and Lucas Paqueta as the midfield pair, while also changing to a three centre-back system.
Admittedly, it had been a fairly positive start to the game from Moyes' team. Not being able to deal with a long throw into the box was where West Ham came unstuck for the opening goal - not something relating to the team's structural set-up.
Although Brentford's attempts on goal were much more threatening, having come from more danger positions, West Ham were able to register 20 shots at goal, throughout the contest.
However, the fact that for much of the second half, Brentford looked so comfortable with their two-goal lead, makes it hard to argue that it was a 'positive' performance from the hosts.
With another disappointing result, the obvious question continues to be asked - how much more time does Moyes have, as West Ham manager?
It seemed a realistic possibility that the disappointing conclusion to their already unproductive pre-World Cup run may lead to a change occurring, before the break. However, the board had opted to retain the services of the man who brought so many positives to the club, over their last two campaigns.
With two disappointing performances and results following the league's restart, Moyes may be running out of opportunities to turn things around with West Ham.
Brentford continue to prove that they belong in the top tier
Following their promotion from the Championship at the end of the 2020/21 season, Brentford have looked like a well-established Premier League unit.
In their first season in the top flight, since 1947, The Bees comfortably negotiated the threat of relegation - Brentford finished 11 points above the drop zone.
They may even have felt that it could have been a more successful campaign for them. Understat's expected points (xPts) table had Brentford in seventh place for the 2021/22 campaign, which would have led to European football.
This time around, they seem much more capable of ensuring that seemingly unlikely outcome becomes a reality, rather than being drawn into a relegation battle.
Even with their win tally being fairly underwhelming for much of this season, an equally low amount of defeats (only four from 17 games) is a huge positive and represents the stern test which Brentford are so often able to provide to any team in the division.
The Bees have managed to gain some very impressive form, at what seemed like the most difficult time to do so. From their last three fixtures - a trip to Manchester City, the visit of Tottenham and last night's game - they picked up a hugely impressive total of seven points.
Another tough test awaits next up - the visit of Liverpool, before the fixture list gradually eases up for Thomas Frank's team.
Ben Mee signing one of the league's top acquisitions
Following his lengthy time at Burnley, where the experienced centre-back notched up over 300 league appearances, last summer's move to the capital has proven to be another fantastic signing from Brentford.
The 33-year-old has been a near ever-present member of the team, missing just one league game, while having a hugely positive impact on their performances.
Mee has brought a great deal of reliability to the left side of central defence. He has only made one mistake leading to a shot, so far this season (SofaScore), while also winning 60% of his aerial and ground duels.
Last night, Mee, Ethan Pinnock and Zanka were able to comfortably get the better of West Ham's big-money forward signing, Gianluca Scamacca.
Seeing the solidity of Brentford's performance makes it slightly strange to see that their defensive record has not been a particularly impressive one, so far this season. A couple of heavy defeats at Aston Villa and Newcastle (0-9 aggregate score) go some way towards ruining the goals conceded figure.
However, it would be difficult to argue against the fact that over the course of the season, Mee has been one of the best value-for-money Premier League signings, following his free transfer to Brentford.
