West Ham sneaks past Southampton in tense relegation six-pointer

West Ham edged past Southampton in a scrappy encounter as the Hammers eased their relegation fears.

FULL MATCH REPLAY

A first half header from Nayef Aguerd was enough for West Ham to secure the 1-0 win over their relegation rivals, as Southampton’s Paul Onuachu hit the crossbar late on in a tight, tense affair at London Stadium.

The win moves David Moyes’ side out of the relegation zone and on to 27 points, while Southampton remain bottom of the table and on 23 points as they are three points from safety with nine games to go.

This was not a classic. And there may be plenty of Premier League games like this between now and the end of the season because are so many teams involved in the relegation scramble. They can be slugfests which see teams go toe-to-toe and deliver hugely entertaining games but this game showed off the understandable nerves teams have about being relegated. West Ham were slightly better with their quality in the final third and that is why they won. However, as the Premier League table suggests, there is very little between the bottom nine teams this season. That gives hope to anybody down there, including Southampton, that they can get out of this.

Lukasz Fabianski: Made some smart stops down low on his return from injury. A calming influence.

Romeo Lavia: Won the ball back often and tried his best to get Saints moving forward from midfield.

The Hammers host Newcastle on Wednesday, April 5. Southampton host Manchester City on Saturday, April 8.

Kick off: 9am ET, Sunday TV Channel: USA Network Online: Stream via NBCSports.com

FULL TIME: West Ham 1-0 Southampton – A nervy win but a hugely important one for the Hammers. They move out of the bottom three and Saints remain bottom. It is still so