Hammers beaten again

Reading heaped the pressure on former manager Alan Pardew after inflicting a fifth straight defeat on struggling West Ham at Upton Park.

Pardew will dismiss as paper talk suggestions he could be replaced by Portugal manager Luiz Felipe Scolari if a takeover of the club does go ahead.

But the statistics do not make pleasant reading for him. West Ham have not won since the opening day of the season, they have not scored in 488 minutes of football and are yet to keep clean sheet all campaign.

Any hopes of rectifying that record were dashed after just one minute and 19 seconds when Seol Ki-Hyeon turned Yossi Benayoun inside out and beat Roy Carroll with a drive from 25 yards.

For newly-promoted Reading, victory meant a fourth successive Premiership game unbeaten - the kind of record Pardew enjoyed with West Ham last season.

Pardew's decision to leave Reading for West Ham in 2003 reached the door of the High Court before a compensation deal was settled. He transformed the club's fortunes and led them into Europe by reaching last year's FA Cup final.

But things have gone sour at Upton Park. West Ham are beset by injuries - they only have four fit defenders in the squad - and were dumped out of the UEFA Cup in midweek.

They dominated the game today but were largely restricted to long-range efforts from Carlos Tevez, Jonathan Spector and Hayden Mullins.

Tevez created plenty of opportunities from deep but West Ham were impotent in front of goal. Even when Pardew made changes for the last 20 minutes luck abandoned them.

Matthew Etherington's low cross from the left flew inches ahead of Bobby Zamora's despairing dive and Benayoun's looped effort was cleared off the line by Reading's impressive midfielder Steve Sidwell.

The Hammers were up against it after just 79 seconds. Hayden Mullins, recalled to a reshaped midfield, fouled Kevin Doyle.

It seemed as if the opportunity had gone. Seol dithered after receiving the ball from Bobby Convey. But he jinked left and then cut back inside to beat Benayoun and drive an unstoppable shot inside Carroll's near post.

Seol later planted a header wide from Convey's cross, but otherwise Reading had few chances and it was West Ham, hungry for a goal, who looked the greater threat.

Benayoun came close to making amends with a tricky run of his own to beat Sidwell and close in on the Reading box but the ball got stuck under his feet before he could get a shot away.

Tevez was a class apart and seems to be adapting well to the pace and rigours of Premiership football.

He caused problems in the Reading defence with driving runs from deep and tested Marcus Hahnemann with an early low drive which bounced just in front of the Reading keeper, who did excellently to hold on.

Tevez was working West Ham into promising positions but he needed the likes of Etherington and Carlton Cole to apply the killer ball or the finishing touch.

The crossing was poor in the first half and Cole wasted two chances with a first touch about as deft as a knocking ball.

The conditions were not helpful but West Ham's confidence is rock bottom. When Nigel Reo-Coker picked up a loose ball in space inside the Reading box he slid the ball across goal instead of testing Hahenemann from barely seven yards on the angle.

When Reo-Coker bundled his way through the Reading defence and slid the ball wide, Etherington's cross sailed high over Cole's head.

Cole almost got his head to Tevez's floated cross and his snapshot was deflected wide just before the interval.

West Ham continued in the same vein after the interval. Etherington nutmegged Ulises De la Cruz and held off Seol to reach the byline, only for Hahenemann to pluck his cross out of the air just ahead of Cole.

Gabbidon rose to head clear a testing cross from Convey and Dailly conceded a corner from a speculative long ball forward when he might have been better advised to let it go out for a goal kick.

Mullins' swirling drive forced Hahenemann into a smart save but Tevez wasted a promising opportunity inside the Reading box after Etherington had picked him out with a neat through-ball and then skewed two efforts wide.

Pardew sent on Teddy Sheringham and Bobby Zamora for Tevez and Cole but it was Benayoun who came closest to rescuing a point.

But Sidwell cleared the Israeli's looped effort from under his own bar.