London (AFP)

By beating Newcastle (2-0) and Sheffield United (3-0), respectively, on Monday in staggered matches in the 24th day of the Premier League, Chelsea and West Ham have overtaken Liverpool who are no longer in the top 4 which qualifies for the Champions League.

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Chelsea at the foot of the podium

The Tuchel effect continues to play to the full in Chelsea with this fourth consecutive success in the league and the 5th in all competitions, which put his team on a very interesting dynamic for the last third of the championship.

Here are the Blues 4th with 42 points and if the title race seems chimerical, Manchester City having 11 points in advance and one game late to play on Wednesday, the gap with Leicester and Manchester United who are ahead of it is only 4 points.

Faced with Newcastle who have taken only eight points since mid-December (13 games), Chelsea has again shown great control, failing to really inspire.

Even the presence in the goals of Kepa, preferred to Edouard Mendy in the cages, and holder in the league for the first time since the 5th day, did not disturb the big defensive solidity of the Londoners.

Besides the victory, the good news of the evening came from the goal of Timo Werner who had not found the net since the beginning of November in the league.

The German saw a ball reach him a little luckily at the far post on a corner and his uneducational recovery just crossed the line before goalkeeper Karl Darlow pulled it out, but the goal was logically validated (2-0, 39th).

Before that, it was Olivier Giroud, who had replaced Tammy Abraham, injured after 20 minutes of play, who had opened the scoring opportunistically, taking in the empty goal a tense cross from Werner for Mason Mount, who had been pushed back in his feet by the decidedly unhappy goalkeeper (1-0, 31st).

- West Ham remains in ambush

This success brings the Londoners' number of points to 42, two more than the Reds.

With 11 points and 14 lengths behind the Magpies, the first non-relegation team, the Sheffield United Blades have little hope of saving themselves.

David Moyes' Hammers made the difference on two set pieces.

First on a penalty obtained at the end of the first period by Jesse Lingard, on loan from Manchester United this winter.

The attacker would have done justice to himself, but it was ultimately captain Declan Rice who took care of it (1-0, 41st).

The second goal came from a corner taken victoriously by the French defender Issa Diop (2-0, 58th).

An almost predictable goal since the Hammers are the team that has scored the most goals from a corner in the Premier League this season (8), while Sheffield is the one that has conceded the most (also 8).

In added time, Ryan Fredericks added a third goal with a shot low to the post from entering the penalty area (3-0, 90 + 4).

Three precious points for West Ham, who will have a stronger schedule in the coming weeks with the reception of Tottenham and two trips to Manchester to challenge United and City, with a reception from the unpredictable Leeds interspersed.

© 2021 AFP