West Ham striker Javier Hernandez feels his side were on the wrong end of some controversial referring decisions in their 3-2 defeat at Southampton.
Manolo Gabbiadini opened the scoring for the home side as Southampton scored their first league goal at St. Mary’s Stadium after over nine hours of football and looked the better team in the first half. Things just got worse for West Ham after Marco Arnautovic was shown a straight red card for elbowing Jack Stephens.
West Ham continued to create their own problems after Jose Fonte conceded a penalty by bringing down Steven Davies and Dusan Tadic converted the spot kick to give the Saints a two-goal lead.
The east Londoners showed some fight towards the end of first half and pulled one goal back when Hernandez scored his first goal for West Ham on the stroke of half time.
The ten men of West Ham continued to be under the cosh in the south coast after the break, but Hernandez again showed his predatory instincts when he latched onto a Diafra Sakho header off the bar to score an unlikely equaliser for West Ham in the 73rd minute.
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Southampton continued to pile on the pressure with Nathan Redmond going close twice with long range efforts and the Hammers finally crumbled in stoppage time.
Maya Yoshida was bundled down inside the penalty box by Pablo Zabaleta and the Saints were awarded their second spot-kick of the match, which Charlie Austin calmly converted to win all three points for Mauricio Pellegrino’s men.
The striker believes the penalty awarded to the home side in stoppage time was a bit harsh and also feels his team-mate Arnautovic did not deserve to receive his marching orders in the first half.
Hernandez is taking the positives out of the game and admits that the two goals for his new club will help him to push on for the rest of the season.
Hernandez was quoted as saying by the BBC: "When you are running most of the game with 10 men, the penalty decision is harsh. We spoke about Marko Arnautovic’s sending off, it is not completely a red card.
“It shows the character of this team that we do not give up.
"You have to look at the positives and to look forward. It is hard with 11 men but with 10 men it is even harder.
“I gained motivation and confidence and happy I scored two but the result is what stays in your head.”
Hernandez and his team-mates have lost their opening two games and will be desperate to get their league season going when they take on Newcastle next weekend.
They will hope to gain some confidence when they play Cheltenham in the EFL Cup on Wednesday night.
