West Ham slipped to their fifth home defeat in a row and deeper into trouble as Brentford stormed to a 2-0 win at the London Stadium.

Not since 1931 have the Hammers lost five in a row at home but this is a football club struggling to find any cohesion or conviction despite changing their head coach from Graham Potter to Nuno Espirito Santo.

Brentford were dominant across the pitch with Igor Thiago opening the scoring after 43 minutes, the striker netting with Brentford’s 15th shot of the first half, before Mathias Jensen wrapped up the points in stoppage time.

The opening goal came courtesy of Max Kilman’s poor attempt at clearing a long ball which allowed Kevin Schade to nip in behind and hook the ball to Thiago, whose finished spun inside the far post.

Areola got a hand to his shot but the ball spun away and nestled inside the far post.

The Bees really should have ran away with the score further but Thiago hit the crossbar, had a goal ruled out for a tight offside call and the excellent Kevin Schade also smacked the woodwork.

Nuno’s first home match in charge coincided with a planned stay-away organised by supporters’ groups in protest against the club’s board and those that stayed away missed little change in their side’s fortunes.

West Ham created just 0.33 worth of expected goals – the fourth lowest of any home team in a game this season – and posted just one shot on target in a worryingly display that leaves them second bottom on just four points.

Nuno: We have a problem at home

Nuno Espirito Santo on issues with atmosphere at home:

“I think we are all concerned. You can feel it from our own fans. You can see that they are concerned. And then this concern becomes in silence. That silence becomes an anxiety. And we have a problem.

“It’s understandable. Since I arrived, clear awareness that it’s up to us to change this.

“I think our fans must see something they like, something that pleases them, so they can support us and give us energy – like we feel it in the beginning of the game.

“Our fans were behind the team because the team was playing good. Then the momentum changed, that’s what we have.

“We try to ignore it. We try to make them feel that they [the players] have to be comfortable so they can express themselves well, but we cannot hide ourselves. It’s there to see.

“It’s there to see the situations that we have, passes not clicking, has to do with many aspects and mentally it’s one of the aspects that we have to swap.”

Carragher: West Ham were shocking

Sky Sports’ Jamie Carragher on West Ham’s performance:

“Shocking. They’ve been shocking for a while, it feels an awful long time ago they won that European trophy under David Moyes. There’s a reason supporters’ reactions at clubs, not just there, very rarely do supporters of their own clubs get it wrong. They know what’s going on at that club – and more often than not it’s not down to managers. The ownership at West Ham now is completely different to the club we’ve just seen battering them on their own patch.

“David Sullivan’s been there for a few years, they won a trophy under David Moyes, but it doesn’t feel a modern way of doing things. That’s where that frustration comes from for the fan base. You look at Brentford as a forward-thinking club – West Ham are a far bigger club but the way they’re run means they can’t compete with them on the pitch.

“Physicality, energy and pace will always be near the top of what you need in this league. I can’t think of a less athletic team I’ve seen in the Premier League over the last 12 months, or for a very, very long time. It’s one of the slowest teams I’ve seen. You see that first goal and it feels like a throwback to 40-50 years ago when everyone had all the time in the world and there was a space. The first goal was absolutely horrendous from a West Ham point of view.”

Analysis: West Ham are relegation fodder

Sky Sports’ Lewis Jones at The London Stadium:

Losing 5-1 to Chelsea was bad. But this was worse.

West Ham were expecting that their worrying start to the season would be remedied by a change of head coach. Yet this is a problem that runs deeper than whoever is leading them from the dugout. Years of lazy and poor recruitment decisions are coming to bite this football club hard now. The fans are sick of it all. The squad of players we’re seeing aren’t built for the rigours of Premier League football.

Once again this West Ham side were bullied in the duels and lacked the ability to compete in key areas of the field. At one stage Tomas Soucek was playing in central midfield on his own after a tactical reshuffle and the results weren’t pretty.

With the newly promoted teams swinging hard and picking up points consistency, bad Premier League teams are going to get punished this season with the real threat of relegation. That is what West Ham are facing. They are very much in the scrap.

Andrews: I felt comfortable at 1-0

Brentford head coach Keith Andrews on Monday Night Football:

“It was very impressive. I felt there was a feeling around the group, I felt really good in the last couple of days with what I’ve been seeing from the group which doesn’t always materialise when it comes to the game but it did tonight.

“We had a lot of courage and personality, and in terms of those relationships building I think we’ve seen that today.

“Naturally you want the second goal to make life a little bit easier.

“We deserved it, but I felt we managed the game pretty well.

“I felt pretty comfortable [at 1-0], to be honest. It’s constant learning for me and the group, how we manage those moments and situations but we have to understand this group is young in the main.

“They’re learning as well how to deal with those situations.”

Story of the match in stats…

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