West Ham 5-0 Saints

• Chigwell Construction Stadium
• Wednesday 12th November 2025

Another League Cup game in the odd little leagues they start the competition with. Saints headed to the rainy home of Dagenham & Redbridge to face a team that hadn’t started their league season very well (currently bottom of the WSL), but are top of the League Cup Group C standings with two wins from two matches, after beating Charlton 5-1 and Brighton 2-1. Saints sit third in the Group C table as the highest-ranked WSL2 team after beating Portsmouth 1-0. But after losing to Brighton, Saints needed a win to have any chance of progressing to the quarter-final stage.

This match was on YouTube with a commentary team who seemed very pro-West Ham (Co-commentator Kate Longhurst is an ex-West Ham player and didn’t hide her hope that the Hammers would win). There were also adverts interrupting the game every 4 or five minutes, which was very annoying.

To be fair to the commentators, they did praise Saints for a strong start, recognising that they were the better team for the early stages of the game. This was despite Saints making a handful of changes, which included a first Saints start for Maria Edwards, and a first start of the season for Aimee Palmer since her return from injury. Edwards had the first chance after just three minutes, a perfectly weighted pass from Ashanti Akpan released the winger down the left, she burst into the box, but saw her angled shot saved.

West Ham grew into the game and had a period of control just before the half-hour mark, but Saints stayed strong and Fran Stenson proved hard to beat in goal. The final chances of the half were from Saints, Palmer forcing the West Ham keeper into a save, and Edwards trying her luck from 25 yards.

In the second half, West Ham looked far more dangerous, and as they brought on more experienced players, they took control. Just after the hour mark, they took the lead when a corner was flicked in at the near post. I missed the second and third goals as they happened during two of the infuriating ad breaks. The fourth and fifth goals came in the six minutes of added time, with Saints tiring.

5-0 was very harsh on Saints, who played very well for a lot of the game, but as the Hammers’ subs came on, Saints’ young side found it hard to cope. Even the commentary team said the scoreline didn’t reflect the game.