Sunderland 3-0 West Ham United
Premier League, Stadium of Light, Saturday 16 August 2025, 3pm BST
West Ham United began the 2025/26 Premier League season with a 3-0 defeat by Sunderland at the Stadium of Light on Saturday.
Roared on by a deafening home crowd, high on belief after winning promotion via the Championship Play-Offs in May and bolstered by a host of new signings, the Black Cats made the perfect return to the Premier League after an eight-year absence.
For West Ham, what looked a difficult-looking opening-day fixture on paper proved to be too difficult in practice as second-half goals from Play-Off winners Eliezer Mayenda, Dan Ballard and Wilson Isidor sent the Londoners back down south with nothing.
The Irons had lost just one of their previous 17 Premier League games against promoted teams and none of their eight most-recent top-flight matches against the Wearsiders. Sunderland, meanwhile, had not won any of their seven most-recent Premier League opening-day fixtures, and tasted victory in just one of their final 14 top-flight matches of the 2016/17 season – their last at this level.
But all those favourable statistics and positive history counted for absolutely nothing, of course, once referee Robert Jones blew for kick-off and, roared on by a near-capacity 46,233-strong crowd, Sunderland deservedly won the game.
West Ham’s inability to take chances, especially in the first half, and to defend balls into their penalty area, ultimately cost them.
Jarrod Bowen and Lucas Paquetá caught the eye in the opening 45 minutes, with the captain’s close control and running and No10’s vision and ability to create angles others to the fore. The skipper went close inside three minutes, but Robin Roefs turned his shot behind. Debutant El Hadji Malick Diouf screwed a shot over from the resulting corner.
Sunderland’s best moment of the half came moments later when Mayenda teed up Habib Diarra to sting debutant goalkeeper Mads Hermansen’s palms.
From then on, West Ham controlled the first half for the most part, but could not score the opening goal. It was to return to haunt them.
Two Niclas Füllkrug flicks created chances midway through, but Reinildo’s toe tackle and Ballard’s vital sliding block denied Bowen and Diouf respectively, before Ballard blocked a Bowen shot, then had a header of his own gathered by Hermansen.
Sunderland started the second half brightly as Simon Adingra poked fellow winger Chemsdine Talbi’s deflected cross wide and Ballard headed another corner off-target either side of home manager Régis Le Bris losing Dutch defender Jenson Seelt to injury.
Then, on 61 minutes, the Stadium of Light erupted as Seelt’s replacement Omar Alderete launched a long, diagonal cross into the box and Mayenda timed his jump perfectly and headed down and inside the left-hand post.
Graham Potter sent on Callum Wilson and Tomáš Souček in a bid to level things up, but instead Sunderland doubled their lead two minutes later.
This time, the long, diagonal cross came from the right boot of Adingra, took a slight deflection, and centre-back Ballard rose to power his header high into the net.
It took until the 78th minute for West Ham to fashion a shot in the second half, when Diouf’s first-time effort was deflected wide. Former Newcastle man Wilson was then denied a debut goal as his flicked header from Andy Irving’s free-kick was acrobatically tipped over by Roefs.
It was all too little, too late, though, as substitute Isidor raced away and beat Hermansen from distance and the home fans celebrated their team going top of the Premier League in the summer sunshine.
Sunderland: Roefs, Hume, Ballard, Seelt (Alderete 53), Reinildo, Xhaka ©, Sadiki, Diarra, Talbi (Rigg 90+3), Adingra (Le Fée 76), Mayenda (Isidor 76)
Subs not used: Patterson (GK), Neil, Roberts, Jones, Guiu
Goals: Mayenda 61, Ballard 73, Isidor 90+2
West Ham United: Hermansen, Wan-Bissaka, Todibo (Irving 82), Kilman, Aguerd, Diouf, Rodríguez (Wilson 71), Ward-Prowse (Souček 71), Paquetá, Bowen ©, Füllkrug
Subs not used: Areola (GK), Walker-Peters, Scarles, Mavropanos, Álvarez, Potts
Booked: Kilman
Referee: Rob Jones
Attendance: 46,233
