Holly Davies reports as West Ham United defeat Blackburn and go 10 games unbeaten.
Two goals coming from in-form Djair Parfitt-Williams and captain, Reece Oxford, proved enough to send the Hammers through to the last four of the Barclays Premier League Under-21s Cup.
Rovers tried to pull back an important goal late in the second half in order put the game into extra time, but great goalkeeping from Sam Howes denied the visitors.
The Hammers got off to a good start as Alex Pike won a corner in a tight space. Leo Chambers connected well to Josh Cullen’s delivery, but Andrew Fisher scrambled it wide for another corner.
The breakthrough came when Parfitt-Williams stroked home from 10 yards after Jaanai Gordon’s effort was parried, to make it 1-0 to the home side.
Threaten
West Ham maintained their dominance and after 33 minutes Oxford doubled the lead with a bullet header from Josh Cullen’s corner.
Blackburn responded at the end of the first half. Sam Lavelle intercepted a poor back heel from Marcus Browne to find Connor Mahoney and he slipped Anton Forrester through on goal to put Rovers back in the game.
West Ham continued to threaten with a third goal late in the second half. First through Moses Makasi who took advantage of defensive hesitancy, then Gordon hitting the side netting five minutes later.
With only two minutes left to play, Howes did incredibly well to get down to his right to deny Mahoney’s shot. Mahoney cut onto his left foot and fired goal-wards but was denied by the brilliant one-handed stop.