West Ham United bounced back from their Liverpool defeat to beat Aston Villa 3-1 at Villa Park.
Tomas Soucek opened the scoring six minutes into the second half before Jesse Lingard scored either side of Ollie Watkins' consolation goal, as the Hammers remain 5th in the Premier League table.
Heading in the game, West Ham had only lost one game in the new calendar year, against Liverpool, and hoped to return to winning ways against Aston Villa.
Dean Smith's Aston Villa entered the game on the back of an away win against Southampton which was dominated by crucial VAR decisions.
-
Story of the match
Jesse Lingard came straight in to David Moyes' starting eleven, ahead of Pablo Fornals, to make his debut for the Hammers since arriving on loan from Manchester United.
Ryan Fredericks also returned to start for West Ham, however, as a right winger.
In a very end-to-end first half, neither side were able to break the deadlock to put their side ahead. Jesse Lingard was running the show, creating multiple chances as he linked up perfectly with his new teammates.
The Hammers had a total of 10 shots in the opening 45 minutes, but were unable to put the ball in the back of net with Emi Martinez pulling off good saves to keep the game at 0-0.
The second half started with a bang.
West Ham scored twice within the first 10 minutes to put Villa out of sight in a very one-sided game. Soucek drilled the ball into bottom corner after Said Benrahma opened the Villa defence up with a great pass.
Minutes later, Benrahma drove a West Ham counter attack forward before Antonio switched the ball to Jesse Lingard, who opened his West Ham account with a strike that Martinez couldn't keep out.
Ollie Watkins brought the home side back into the game, with a cool finish from a Jack Grealish pass that split the West Ham backline.
However, minutes later, Lingard sealed his West Ham debut with a second of the night, smashing the ball past a weak Martinez hand and sending West Ham back to East London with three big points.
-
Takeaways
David Moyes' Masterpiece
David Moyes made two changes to his side that lost to Liverpool at the London Stadium. Fredericks came in to replace Jarrod Bowen on the right side of midfield instead of his natural position, right-back. Lingard also came in, taking Fornals role behind Antonio.
In a press conference ahead of the game, Moyes highlighted the big role Grealish plays in the Villa side. Putting Fredericks just in front of Vladimir Coufal, the two right-backs boxed the English midfielder in, preventing Grealish to play football the way he has been doing all season.
The tricky attacker could not create one chance in his preferred position of left-wing, forcing him to swap sides with Anwar El Ghazi throughout the game. Grealish did not create any real threat in the 80 minutes prior to Watkins goal.
West Ham, as usual, defended superbly and the brilliant Moyes tactics have kept the Hammers in reach of the Champions League positions.
-
Man of the Match
Despite Soucek playing brilliantly once again, Jesse Lingard deserves the Man of the Match award. Coming into the starting XI after only a day of training, the midfielder connected the Hammers attack throughout the game and caused the Villa to have a nightmare all night.