Defending Champions Manchester City began their title defence with a victory at the London Stadium, against Former manager Manuel Pellegrini’s West Ham side.
West Ham began the game trying to pose a threat to City and did that without success but it was City who began to control the game with AFCON champion Riyad Mahrez testing the goalkeeper Lukas Fabianski with a low shot from outside the eighteen posing the first real opportunity of the game.
City then got their goal in the 25th minute with Mahrez again pushing the ball up front for a show of pace from Kyle Walker to get past the West Ham defender and captain as he put in a low driven cross which picked up a deflection from Diop before Gabriel Jesus converted with a difficult touch and sumptuous finish to put City 1-0 up. With Manchester City controlling the possession and having most of the ball, the first half ended 1-0 with no real opportunity from both sides.
Raheem Sterling put City 2-0 up in the 51st minute with A quick counter attack with Riyad Mahrez again picking the ball from the center of the field and picked De Bruyne who pushed forward and gave Sterling the pass as the English forward smoothly converted the goal.
A minute later the VAR came to action for the first time this season as a slight offside call canceled off Gabriel Jesus’ goal with Sterling slightly offside after a defence splitting pass and move from Sterling, Zinchenko, Silva and to Sterling again opened up the defence for Sterling to simply put a pass for Gabriel Jesus to convert with ease.
In the 72nd minute Ederson superb reflexes stopped West Ham from scoring with a Double Save first to stop a knee touch from Hernandez and a header from Lazini.
The VAR came to work for the second time in the game with Sterling involved again but this time it was in his favour as Mahrez smoothly picked out the English Winger with a Lob pass as Sterling calmly lobbed the out rushing goalkeeper.
In the 83rd minute two new rules on a penalties came to effect for the first time in the Premier League as Mahrez forced a penalty which Sergio Aguero had his first attempt saved by Fabianski, but after not having both legs on the line during the run up and Declan Rice in the 18 yard box during the same run up to clear the ball, a retake was enforced by VAR and for the Second time of trying Aguero picked his spot and converted to put City 4-0 up.
And in added time, Riyad Mahrez picked out Raheem Sterling once again with a through pass and the Hat-trick seeker found his hat-trick as he used the positioned Aguero as a decoy to confuse the rushing goalkeeper as he converted smoothly to complete his hat-trick and give City a 5-0 victory over West Ham.