David Moyes' Kurt Zouma gamble and Jarrod Bowen's wasted chances among West Ham talking points

When Kurt Zouma ’s name was revealed to be in the starting XI for West Ham on Thursday night, a wry smile of ‘mission accomplished’ might have passed David Moyes’ lips for a brief second.

The centre-back, a £30million signing from Chelsea last summer, had successfully been smuggled through the week. Hidden away from reporters at West Ham’s open training session on Wednesday morning and seemingly still unavailable due to injury up until the moment the team sheets were passed around the London Stadium.

In the build-up to the game, Moyes had been coy on the Frenchman’s return from an ankle injury that saw him miss the previous two Premier League matches against Burnley and Chelsea. He spoke of the risk it would be to field any player coming back from a knock, though it’s precisely what he decided to do against Frankfurt, surprising not only the West Ham fans but likely Frankfurt boss Oliver Glasner too.

Craig Dawson had previously manned the fort alone as the club’s only fit senior centre-back, with Ben Johnson and Aaron Cresswell placed into an unfamiliar back three at Stamford Bridge which survived for all of 90 minutes before conceding late on. Moyes clearly thought his side would fare better with Zouma back in the side, reverting to a back four and, crucially, keeping Declan Rice in midfield rather than needing him to drop into defence as he did for the final minutes against the Blues.

But although fit enough to play the full 90 minutes, Zouma didn’t quite give his manager the performance - or the clean sheet - that he desired. There were two cheap goals given away which showed a clear sign of rustiness, albeit Zouma was not solely responsible for both ending up in the back of Alphonse Areola’s net.

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