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Valon Behrami's first goal in English football has given West Ham a 1-0 win at Sunderland in the Premier League.

The Swiss midfielder's 20th-minute drive took a wicked deflection off Kenwyne Jones and nestled in the top-left corner after the hosts failed to fully clear a corner.

Sunderland huffed and puffed but in truth rarely threatened Robert Green, who only made straightforward saves even though his team-mates saw very little of the ball.

The result could have been different but for Wirral referee Mike Dean's inaction on two occasions.

The first came on 34 minutes when Hammers defender James Collins pulled Djibril Cisse down on the edge of the box when he was clean through. It was a red-card offence but Dean waved play on with his assistant also failing to flag.

The contact was clear - Collins's right arm interlinked with Cisse's left - and only argument in Dean's favour is that he may have thought Cisse made the initial contact.

The second contentious incident was a handball in the area by Matthew Upson, whose left arm blocked Cisse's shot two minutes after the second-half restart.

Dean again waved play on, although this time there was no doubt as to the offence.

Sunderland had almost 60 per cent of the possession, but they used it wastefully. In an attempt to use the height of Jones and bypass West Ham's neat-passing midfield, the Black Cats pumped long balls, straight and diagonal, towards the Trinidad and Tobago hit-man.

But Collins and England star Upson were rocks at the back, the former winning most headers and the latter clever in his positioning and use of the ball.

As a result, many of the hosts' opportunities were speculative efforts from distance, although Cisse missed two headers that he should have at least got on target.

Andy Reid had a long-range effort bounce off the top of the Hammers crossbar and Phil Bardsley saw two efforts go wide, but otherwise Green was barely tested.

Despite their lack of possession, West Ham had the best chance to score following their opener when Craig Bellamy and Behrami somehow failed to find the back of the net just before half time.

Ferdinand had miscontrolled a long ball, which let Bellamy clean through. But instead of finishing past Marton Fulop, the Wales captain tried to round the Sunderland keeper and roll it into an empty net.

He only succeeded in forcing himself too wide to have a clear sight of goal and, while he cut back and created another chance to score, he opted for the 'safer' option of setting up Behrami for a simple finish into an empty net.

But the former Lazio winger somehow put his shot against the crossbar.

Aside from the incredible miss, it was an ordinary match and the second half saw few clear-cut chances.

Black Cats boss Roy Keane made three changes, bringing on El-Hadji Diouf, Carlos Edwards and Daryl Murphy, but they had little effect as West Ham clung onto a win that puts them 11th and leaves Sunderland two points above the drop zone.

Reda Maher / Eurosport