Alan Curbishley achieved in one game with his new club West Ham United something he was unable to do in fifteen years at Charlton. He managed to beat them in the Premiership.

He has been in charge for less than a week and has had a number of fitness and injury worries to deal with. With nothing to lose he set his side up to play 4-4-2 as opposed to the 4-5-1 system that he had favoured at Charlton.

The hammers were completely out played by the league leaders with Giggs and Ronaldo their main tormentors. Although Ronaldo inflated the shooting stats by trying his luck from almost anywhere much to the annoyance of Saha and Rooney.

Curbishley brought off Zamora for United old boy Teddy Sheringham to hold up the ball and pose their defence a few problems. However it was his strike partner Marlon Harewood that disrupted the united defence and set up club captain Nigel Reo-Coker to score the goal that won the game for his current manager although in the press conference after the game he dedicated the strike to former manager Alan Pardew, who must have been asking himself how the same players that were destroyed by Bolton last week could beat the league leaders this week. A question that the players should be asking themselves in the wake of Pardew’s dismissal last week.