Here are three quick thoughts from Arsenal's 3-0 Premier League win over West Ham on Wednesday at the Emirates.

1. Gunners breeze past sorry Hammers

Arsenal stepped over Manchester United into fifth place in the table to restore hopes of returning to the top four, while West Ham's run of six successive defeats has them looking over their shoulder toward the Premier League's bottom three.

Relegation now looms large and dangerously for Slaven Bilic's team, who are just five points clear of 18th-placed Swansea, outclassed by an opponent given far too much space to mess up the chance of securing a morale-boosting win, Arsenal's first in the Premier League since a 2-0 win over Hull on Feb. 11.

Mesut Ozil's 58th-minute opener came amid unrelenting pressure on the Hammers' defence, and the Emirates sighed with relief as his cross-shot drifted beyond the reach of keeper Darren Randolph.

Theo Walcott's finish for the 68th-minute second was simple, slotted in after Ozil and Alexis Sanchez linked incisively. It took the sting from an evening that had previously been tense before Oliver Giroud whipped in a raking strike for an 84th-minute third.

There would be no terrace barracking of Arsene Wenger, who had raged at the fourth official in the 20th minute when Hammers left-back Arthur Masuaku escaped giving away a clear penalty for barging Walcott to the ground. Arsenal's case was strong, but they were soon guilty of failing to capitalise on West Ham's haphazard defending when they should have been out of sight by half-time.

There was a series of near misses. Danny Welbeck failed to make a proper connection on a clever Sanchez free kick, as Randolph collected the ball with relief. Walcott, captain for the night, overcooked his shot after an error from James Collins.

Mohamed Elneny smashed the ground in frustration after failing to capitalise on Sanchez's neat work and a subsequent shot by Hector Bellerin that had landed at the Egyptian's mercy. For West Ham, Collins was heroic, blocking shot after shot as the permanent last man, but he proved unable to stop Ozil's goal, which drifted past him and beyond the reach of the overworked Randolph.

For Arsenal, there was heartening news at the back too. Despite being without injured captain Laurent Koscielny and goalkeeper Petr Cech, they were able to keep a first Premier League clean sheet since that Hull win. Things are looking up for Arsenal at last, while West Ham can only look down in anxiety.

2. Uncertainty reigns at the Emirates

The stadium took time to fill up from the kickoff, with some fans refusing to take their seats until the 13th minute -- the number significant as the number of years since Arsenal won a league title. The Emirates is wracked with uncertainty these days, with the futures of Wenger, Sanchez and Ozil still cloudy.

For the first half-hour, Arsenal's players performed with a similar lack of belief in the cause as home fans, who were very quiet until their team look the lead. At times, the players could be heard barking instructions at one another.

Almost every postmatch interview that Wenger gives talks of his players' nerves, yet he seems incapable of sending them out with calm confidence. There was distinct vulnerability in the early stages, with some poor decisions being taken, too many fouls committed in areas that gave West Ham chance to aim dead balls at the head of Andy Carroll.

Bellerin, meanwhile, was booked for tugging Michail Antonio's shirt straight after referee Martin Atkinson had waved away those claims for a penalty-box foul on Walcott. Arsenal's sense of injustice had boiled over and left them vulnerable.

In the second half, with Arsenal finally in front and West Ham having to show some adventure, Shkodran Mustafi made a hacking lunge at the shins of Hammers substitute Robert Snodgrass and was perhaps lucky to escape with the yellow card he received. Had Atkinson not been so lenient, West Ham might have had a route back into the game.

Although Arsenal prevailed over West Ham by virtue of that far greater quality eventually telling, there was still a distinct raggedness at the heart of the team. And it will probably remain that way when those uncertainties wrack the club.

3. Hammers heading for relegation trouble

Having lost their past four and not won in six, West Ham arrived at the Emirates in pessimism rather than hope. Hammers fans were keeping an eye on matters elsewhere, with Hull's 4-2 defeat of Middlesbrough bad news and Swansea's 3-1 loss to Spurs better tidings.

Bilic's future is now under serious question. His team, brimming with fight when reaching seventh place last season, have the unhappy habit of surrendering with far too much ease. They have not kept a clean sheet since a Jan. 14 defeat of Crystal Palace, either, making them ideal opponents for Arsenal, previously so low on spirit.

They began brightly enough, with Manuel Lanzini going close from a free kick and then Mark Noble bursting through the centre to drill wide a shot that probably had stand-in keeper Emiliano Martinez beaten.

A failure to build on promising foundations has been a repeated pattern in the Hammers' lurching season, and by the end of the first half, they were defending deep and none too convincingly. The loss at half-time to injury of Antonio, star player this season amid an admittedly shallow pool, after he had just returned from a hamstring problem was further damage to hopes of keeping away from the drop.

Source:
courtesy of ESPNFC

by JOHN BREWIN

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