Stewie salutes 'brilliant' Burke

Stewart Downing heaped plaudits on Premier League debutant Reece Burke
Stewart Downing heaped plaudits on young Reece Burke, after the 18-year-old gave a mature display in his Barclays Premier League debut against Queens Park Rangers on Saturday. 

The Newham-born defender was thrown into the mix following injury to Winston Reid and Downing felt he had seen plenty to suggest the youngster has a big future in the game. 

Up against Charlie Austin and Bobby Zamora, Burke battled gamely alongside fellow centre-half James Collins and looked right at home at the heart of the Hammers’ rear guard. 

“He’s waited a long time for his chance,” Downing explained. He’s done well for the youth team, he’s travelled a lot of times and not been involved.

“But Reidy [Winston Reid] goes down injured late on and he’s thrown in, sometimes that’s the best way to be. He has proven himself with his performance. I thought he was absolutely brilliant against Bobby Zamora, who’s had a really good season, and Charlie Austin’s scored nearly every other game, so I thought he played really, really, well.” 

That said, Downing reckons he may need to rethink his hairstyle if he wants to become a seasoned centre-half a la Collins.   

“He’ll have to go skinhead with Ginge! He’s done really well, a young boy up against really experienced strikers, strong lads as well. I thought he handled them very, very well. He’s probably man of the match for me.” 

As for the future, West Ham’s No11 believes that Burke has shown enough to earn the confidence of manager Sam Allardyce and so can expect to be in the reckoning for the coming weeks and beyond.    

“I’m not sure whether he’ll be in from the start next season, Reidy, Ginge and Tonks [James Tomkins] might have something to say about that. But he’s certainly in that mix, we know we can depend on him now, the manager can put him in there any time, home or away and he’ll do the job. 

“That was a big performance from him and he’ll be a big player for the future. You need people like that coming through.” 
That was a big performance from Reece and he’ll be a big player for the future. You need people like that coming through.
Reflecting on Saturday’s goalless draw, Downing said the Hammers were indebted to ‘keeper Adrian for his latest spot-kick heroics. It may be that the Spaniard’s form has gone under the radar somewhat, but the Middlesbrough-born midfielder said West Ham know exactly how important he is. 

He continued: “Adrian certainly gets the credit he deserves from us. You can see that the fans love him and the lads obviously appreciate him. He has made some big saves this season. He got my vote for player of the year, so that shows you. 

“It was a great save, Charlie Austin’s had an unbelievable season and nine time out of ten he’d bury that penalty. But Adrian’s really good at penalties, it was a good save and it kept us in the game.” 

Overall, however, Downing deemed that the point was probably about fair. Though the 30-year-old had no complaints about the spot-kick, he thought the Hammers were good value for their clean sheet and was just sorry that the visitors failed to carve out a late winner.

“They’ve missed a good chance with the penalty and we had a couple late on, so overall I think it was probably a fair result. We get a point back on the board, a clean sheet, so there’s a positive there, but we’d like to have won on Saturday. 

“There wasn’t too much fuss with the referee so I’m guessing it was a penalty. It was probably a bit unlucky but Adrian’s got us out of trouble again with a great save.

"Overall, at the end, if we’d got a goal, it would have been nice to nick a 1-0 away win, because I thought we defended very well.”