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West Ham delivered 'perfect performance' in Wolves rout, says Mavropanos

  /  autty

Konstantinos Mavropanos described West Ham's 4-0 win over Wolves as the "perfect performance" as they eased their relegation fears in style at the London Stadium. 

Mavropanos and Valentin Castellanos both scored twice on Friday, moving the Hammers out of the Premier League bottom three, and dropping rivals Tottenham below them.

A nervy first half ended with Mavropanos nodding Jarrod Bowen's corner past Jose Sa before Castellanos poked into the net after the break following Pablo's clever flick. 

The result was put beyond doubt less than two minutes later by Castellanos, with Mavropanos sealing the win seven minutes from time with an acrobatic finish from close range.

Mavropanos now has three goals in his last three Premier League appearances for West Ham. He had only scored one goal in his first 81 games in the competition for the Hammers and former club Arsenal combined.

But, more importantly, West Ham's biggest Premier League victory since beating Bournemouth 4-0 in April 2023 came at a crucial time in their campaign. 

"These kinds of wins give us a big boost for the rest of the season because we have been working really hard," Mavropanos told Sky Sports.

"We have got some really good results in the past games and today again we saw a great effort by our fans at home, a clean sheet. I think it was a perfect performance.

"We said that we have to stay calm throughout the game because Wolves have some good players.

"We stuck together and scored the first goal and in the second half we saw more of our work, and we scored more goals."

The result ensures West Ham will end the night outside the relegation zone for just the second time in 2026, along with 14 March, while piling the pressure on Spurs, who face Sunderland on Sunday in Roberto De Zerbi's first game in charge. 

And Nuno Espirito Santo's side are hitting form at the right time. They have won five of their last 11 Premier League matches (D3 L3).

Since, and including, the first game in this run against Spurs on January 17, only Manchester United (23) and Arsenal (21) have won more points than the Hammers (18).

West Ham were deserving of their win too, having registered an expected goals (xG) total of 1.68 from their 18 shots, seven of which were on target, compared to Wolves' measly tally of 0.61 from their 14 attempts. 

Ahead of the rest of the weekend's action, where Nottingham Forest face Aston Villa and Leeds United travel to Manchester United on Monday, the Opta supercomputer has assigned West Ham a 54.7% chance of avoiding relegation, though Nuno did not want to get too carried away.

"We spoke after the game and the way we did it tonight proved to ourselves that we cannot give up," Nuno added. That was the team spirit from the beginning.

"Never give up, we are in the fight. I realise we have a lot of work to do yet. We made a big step today, important for us, but nothing has changed."