'VAR just relegated West Ham!' - Nottingham Forest benefit from two controversial decisions as Hammers edge further towards Premier League drop

West Ham were beaten 2-1 by Nottingham Forest in the Premier League in dramatic circumstances on Tuesday evening. The Hammers had the lead thanks to a Murillo own goal after 13 minutes and thought they had added a second when Crysencio Summerville finished well, but his strike was ruled out for an offside in the build-up, with replays showing that Taty Castellanos was very narrowly offside. Just minutes later, Forest equalised through Nicolas Dominguez and then, in injury time, Alphonse Areola was ruled to have fouled Morgan Gibbs-White; in attempting to punch the ball, he appeared to punch the midfielder in the face. Gibbs-White recovered to score from 12 yards and leave the Irons 18th, with just 14 points. They are now seven points behind Forest.

@WestHamTransfer said: "VAR has just relegated West Ham United."

@MackAttack said: "Bored of VAR and don't really get why they're looking at that in slow motion while reviewing it. Can only envy West Ham getting relegated to a league where they play football and not watch referees at screens."

@Bi2arro added: "The way West Ham will be ransacked if they get relegated will be a sight to see."

@TCrossland55 said: "Least our marvellous captain and best player Jarrod Bowen turned up tonight. Another ghost performance along with the rest of the clowns, it was offside and it was a penalty let’s be honest, don’t give them an excuse my blaming the officials."

@Chels1an continued: "Feel for Jarrod Bowen. He's absolutely busting his ass to keep this pants team full of scrubs in the league and he doesn't need to do all that. If we weren't stocked up on left footed right sided forwards I'd say we should try to loan him for 6 months. Someone should save him."

And Millwall fan Danny Baker, who goes by @Prodnose on social media, concluded: "I am a Millwall supporter. Nothing pleases us more than West Ham struggling. But that was not a penalty. Goalkeeper goes for ball at same time as forward. Someone gets there first and they collide. VAR is such an obscenity to the game."

Reports before the clash with Forest claimed that the Irons were going to consider Nuno's future if they were beaten by Forest, and he could now be the latest casualty of the managerial merry-go-round. However, he insists that the Irons' bid to survive is "not over". 

He said after the game: "I think we did enough good things to win the match today. The boys really worked hard. We got the advantage, we scored a goal ruled out by fine margins of offside, that was the moment of the game, and a lot of incidents happened, but I've got nothing to say about the hard work.

"That was the idea [score early] and the boys did it. We had good combinations and control, we had good threat in attack. It was a good first half. We started the second half well. There was a foul on the edge of the box on Summerville and then that leads to Forest breaking out. This takes the mind out of the players and makes it hard to explain how things happen."

On the penalty, he added: "It happens so many times during the matches that you get confused about the rules honestly. How many times has this happened and penalties have not been given? So I don't quite understand. Areola goes for the ball, Soucek takes the ball out and then he cannot stop his movement, so hard to explain."

He concluded: "You know me. I'll keep on going, believing and working with the boys. Sometimes you have good moments and bad moments but you need to be resilient enough to understand that this is the game."

West Ham face back-to-back London derbies in two different competitions. First, they face Queens Park Rangers in the third round of the FA Cup, before a Premier League clash away at Tottenham. The Irons have not won any of their last 10 fixtures, and have not recorded a victory since November 8.