Premier League Sunday results: Chelsea thrash West Ham 5-0 to keep European hopes alive

Premier League results

• Chelsea 5-0 West Ham
• Brighton 1-0 Aston Villa
• Liverpool 4-2 Tottenham

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Palmer on target at Stamford Bridge again

Chelsea kept up their electric goalscoring form at home and boosted their hopes of European football with a 5-0 thrashing of West Ham.

Mauricio Pochettino’s side have now scored 22 times in their last six Premier League games at Stamford Bridge, and here there was a fluency to their attacking play that could well have yielded substantially more than the five they put past the hapless visitors.

Chelsea were three up at the break. First, Cole Palmer netted the 21st league goal of his debut season in west London, steering a loose ball into the corner, then Conor Gallagher volleyed home.

Sky Bet: Chelsea 3/1 for top six finish this season

Noni Madueke headed the third near the end of an excellent first half, before Nicolas Jackson took his tally for the season to 13 in the league with a brace after the interval.

Chelsea climbed to seventh after recording back-to-back league wins for the first time since January, and there is increasingly the feeling that, after a difficult start, the players are responding to their head coach’s methods.

For David Moyes’ Hammers, this was a calamitous display. Eliminated from Europe and now all but out of the race to qualify again next year, it was hard to avoid a sense of a promising season petering out as the Chelsea goals flew past Alphonse Areola and their players came to look more and more dejected.

Liverpool cruise past Spurs with Salah back on scoresheet

Mohamed Salah finally rediscovered his form – unfortunately too late for Liverpool’s Premier League title hopes – as Tottenham were dispatched in an occasionally slapdash 4-2 victory at Anfield.

A week ago it was all about the Egyptian off the pitch, with his touchline disagreement with Jurgen Klopp spilling over into his incendiary comment in the mixed zone which did little to calm the row.

But, restored to the team, Salah was in the form prior to his January hamstring injury, engaged from the start and scoring the opener to become the club’s record goalscorer against Spurs.

He provided the assists for Andy Robertson and Harvey Elliott to net the second and fourth and gave makeshift left-back Emerson Royal such a torrid time the defender found himself being singled out by team-mate Cristian Romero as they walked off at half-time, with goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario separating the pair.

While Romero was seemingly the only Tottenham defender willing to put his body in the way he was not without fault as he was easily out-jumped by Cody Gakpo for Liverpool’s third.

The disorder within the Spurs ranks was only exceeded by the party atmosphere at Anfield on the occasion of Klopp’s penultimate appearance here as manager.

But Liverpool have not kept a clean sheet since Nottingham Forest on March 2 and this was the ninth successive time they have conceded as the game took on a typical end-of-season exhibition flavour.

Substitute Richarlison slotted home a near-post shot and then Son scored at Anfield for the fourth consecutive time after the defence completely switched off.

However, although confidence was restored it was all ultimately pointless as third place had already been secured by Aston Villa’s defeat earlier in the day and the celebrations were laced with regret at a missed opportunity in the title race.

Where was this form – of both Salah and the team – against Crystal Palace, Everton and West Ham when the run-in was a critical point?

The irreversible damage was done in the last fortnight of April for Liverpool, who are five points behind leaders Arsenal.

Aston Villa's Champions League hopes dealt a late blow

Aston Villa’s quest for Champions League qualification suffered a setback after Joao Pedro ended Brighton’s six-match Premier League winless run with a dramatic 87th-minute winner.

Unai Emery’s side travelled to the Amex Stadium knowing victory combined with a Tottenham loss to Liverpool later in the day would guarantee a fourth-placed finish.

But Villa, who are juggling their top-flight commitments with a run to the semi-finals of the Europa Conference League, laboured for large parts of a tight south-coast encounter and were beaten 1-0 after Pedro headed home the rebound when his late penalty was saved by Robin Olsen.

Second-choice keeper Olsen produced a series of fine stops to prevent the Seagulls taking an earlier lead, while Pascal Gross had a second-half finish ruled out for offside following a lengthy VAR review.

With 19-goal top scorer Ollie Watkins a peripheral figure, the visitors barely threatened, albeit captain John McGinn also had a goal chalked off.

Odds correct at 1615 BST (05/05/24)

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