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da roleta： With Antonio Conte’s demise nearing completion, a familiar nemesis popped up to slam home an equaliser for West Ham at Stamford Bridge last season. Exactly one year on from that day, the Irons will once again make the short journey from east to west London on Monday night to face Chelsea on their home turf A freakish fixture list anomaly has thrown up an identical clash on the same day in back-to-back seasons.
Roman Abramovich resisted the seemingly insatiable urge to pull the trigger on Maurizio Sarri’s predecessor and delayed until July 2018 after months of speculation, but the writing was firmly sprayed on the wall three months earlier when West Ham exposed the frailties in Conte’s tactical system.
Hernandez, who made it nine goals from 14 appearances against the Blues last season, scored a deserved equaliser to salvage a 1-1 draw for the relegation-threatened visitors.
It took just one aimless long ball over the top to unpick Chelsea’s defensive unit. Marko Arnautovic reacted first to a feeble attempt to clear the ball, swivelled his hips and struck a perfectly weighted half-volley into Hernandez’s path, before the beady-eyed forward emphatically dispatched from the right of the penalty spot.
His appetite to find the net against Chelsea is underlined by the regularity of his goal-scoring exploits. He has scored in nine different fixtures and, with Maurizio Sarri facing a level of uncertainty over his future which Conte was also haunted by this time last year, fate and history are willing the little pea to continue his prolific run.
In the Premier League alone he has managed to notch five goals from eight appearances, including three at Stamford Bridge. The Hammers supporters may have their reservations about his effectiveness at the spearhead of the attack but you cannot argue with his form against Monday’s opponents.
Marko Arnautovic is a doubt for the clash and Lucas Perez was underwhelming alongside the Austrian against Everton last time out. With that said, Manuel Pellegrini will naturally be turning his focus towards the diminutive forward, using his pedigree in this fixture as a tool for his selection policy.
To label Sarri a dead man walking would be a gross exaggeration of his diminishing security but Chelsea’s infamous tradition of dismissing managers for simply having the audacity to set foot in the dugout doesn’t bode well for his long-term future.
A place in the top-four is on the line, just as it was when West Ham arrived at this time last year, and the Italian will be acutely aware of the need to clinch all three points with four teams tightly-knitted together in a multi-million pound race for just two spots.
Conte failed to usurp the likes of Manchester United and Tottenham into the top-four last season, and it became clear that their top-four ambitions were left in a cloud of Mexican smoke when Hernandez’s strike left them 10-points adrift of Spurs.
Another moment of decisive, dead-eyed prowess from Hernandez wouldn’t leave Sarri in such a dire position, but with just a handful of points left to play for it could be a decisive slice in history that bears remarkable resemblance to events which unfolded exactly 365 days ago.
The stage is set for history to repeat itself in a bizarre injection of Déjà vu with Chicharito in town.