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maltatoday SUNDAY 10 DECEMBER 2017 53 FOOTBALL Sports Chelsea stunned by West Ham, Tottenham return to form Marko Arnautovic makes it 1-0 for West Ham against Chelsea CHELSEA'S hopes of retaining the Premier League title suffered a severe blow as West Ham Unit- ed upset the form book to win the London derby 1-0 yesterday and give David Moyes his first victory since taking over as manager. Marko Arnautovic's early goal and a gritty rearguard action by the Hammers inflicted a first league defeat in eight games on third-placed Chelsea who are 11 points behind leaders Man- chester City ahead of their game against second-placed Manches- ter United on Sunday. Tottenham Hotspur returned to form with a first win in five league games, thrashing Stoke City 5-1 with Harry Kane scoring twice as Spurs moved back into fifth place. Burnley are level on 28 points with Tottenham and Arsenal af- ter beating 10-man Watford 1-0 at a wintry Turf Moor thanks to Scott Arfield's goal on the stroke of halftime. Watford were reduced to 10 men from the 39th minute after Marvin Zeegelaar was shown a straight red for a wild tackle. Christian Benteke missed a stoppage-time penalty that would have given Crystal Palace victory over Bournemouth but they had to be content with a 2-2 draw as Jermain Defoe scored twice for the visitors at Selhurst Park. Swansea City climbed off the bottom, above Palace, with a 1-0 home victory over West Brom- wich Albion that ended a near two-month run without a victory. With West Ham and Swansea winning only six points separate the bottom nine clubs with West Ham only in the bottom three because of an inferior goal differ- ence to West Brom. Huddersfield Town ended a four-game losing streak to ease into mid-table with a 2-0 victory over fellow promoted side Bright- on and Hove Albion. In the day's late kickoff, Leices- ter City recovered from conced- ing early at Newcastle United to triumph 3-2 with their late winner coming from an own goal by Ayoze Perez. Newcastle are two points above the drop zone while im- proving Leicester moved into the top eight. Chelsea fell behind after six minutes at the London Stadi- um as former Stoke midfielder Arnautovic curled a shot past Thibaut Courtois for his first West Ham strike. With Adrian in goal, rather than England keeper Joe Hart who was dropped, West Ham dug deep and restrained Chel- sea, although they did breathe a sigh of relief when Alvaro Morata wasted a late chance to equalise for Antonio Conte's side. Conte wrote off his side's title hopes. "To talk about the title race after a defeat is a bit strange, especially if this is the fourth defeat of the season in 16 games," Conte said. "When you have this start, it is impos- sible to think you are in the ti- tle race." Moyes has steadied the West Ham ship and while they are still in the bottom three, last week's narrow defeat at Man- chester City and victory over Chelsea offers renewed hope. "We need our season to turn now. We've beaten the champi- ons today, it's a great achieve- ment for us and a great three points," Moyes said. Tottenham led at halftime through a Ryan Shawcross own goal but cut loose after the break with Kane's double taking his Premier League tally for the cal- endar year to 33, three less than the record 36 scored by Alan Shearer in 1996. Palace could have moved level on points with fourth-from-bot- tom West Brom but Benteke's weak penalty denied them the three points, much to his man- ager Roy Hodgson's annoyance as Benteke was not allocated to take spot-kicks. "If you do that you really have to score or you face the wrath of your manager, the coaches and your team mates," said Hodgson, whose side have drawn four of their last five.