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Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain: The Arsenal winger, perhaps thriving as a consequence of his winning goal against Chelsea in the Community Shield, is playing with a previously-unseen confidence. He almost scored a delightful goal, at 0-0, and consistently succeeded when taking on any one of West Ham's defence. He naively contributed to West Ham's second goal but this season could still prove his making capitalising on the absence of Alexis Sanchez to remain in Arsenal's starting XI, particularly with Euro 2016 at the season's end.
MOMENT OF THE MATCH
Petr Cech: Much has been said and written about the strengths of Arsenal's £11million summer signing from rivals Chelsea but none could be seen when West Ham took the lead. Dimitri Payet's delivery from a free-kick was exceptional, but the supposedly-commanding Cech was caught out of position when appearing to misread the flight of the ball, meaning Cheikhou Kouyate's rather-routine header ended up as a goal.
VIEW FROM THE BENCH
With so much at stake for West Ham over the coming 12 months, and following their rather embarrassing Europa League exit by Astra Giurgiu on Thursday, animated new manager Slaven Bilic required an impressive result to avoid the type of pressure that can so quickly build, and he got it. There is rightly renewed patience in Arsene Wenger at the Emirates, particularly since retaining the FA Cup in May, but that does not mean he has yet addressed his team's long-term weaknesses.
MOAN OF THE MATCH
Same old Arsenal? Arsene Wenger's team were typically stylish and entertaining but they also wasted multiple goalscoring chances before conceding the most preventable of goals. Thereafter the pressure was on, when an early goal would have likely led to a convincing, one-sided victory. On a separate note, at 2-0 up, West Ham's fans began chanting "are you watching [Sam] Allardyce?". Did their former manager really do them that much harm?
WHO'S UP NEXT
Crystal Palace v Arsenal (Premier League, Sunday 16 August)
West Ham v Leicester (Premier League, Saturday, 15 August)
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