By Louis Nixon

West Ham’s captain Jarrod Bowen might not have gotten on the scoresheet tonight, but his clinical, tricky performance shouldn’t go unnoticed.

Bowen played 89 minutes this afternoon before being brought off and he absolutely ran his heart out tonight, a very atypical performance from Jarrod, given that he only had one shot the entire game, but that was due to the majority of our attacking threats coming through the middle of the park or the left side. 

Across the 89, he completed the most dribbles out of any player, whilst also winning the most duels of anyone on the pitch, with 7. He made the critical passes in the crucial moments and managed to be in the right place at the right time. 

We’ve got two fantastic wingers at the moment and if a manager says let’s stick two players on Bowen to mark him out the game, it’ll leave Summerville open, and that’s exactly what happened. The Burnley players frantically rushed towards Bowen in any moment that he had the ball or seemingly posed a threat, but overall, it left gaps to open where we eventually took advantage of. 

It’s the ugly side of Football but a beautiful part of the game. 

When you have a player such as Bowen who poses such a threat, his skill set provides much more than what meets the eye, and it was golden to see it today. 

He would only have one shot on goal, which was a strike from range that glided over the bar, but that’s not disappointing to see. He worked with Wan-Bissaka to help track back and often found himself lingering around the centre midfield to pick up the ball and drive it forward to others who could create the chances. 

Sometimes individual performances are more than stats and are more than what meets the eye, but this afternoon was a well-worked stint for the captain and he should be nothing but proud of how the game went, a crucial three glamorous points achieved.