West Ham United U23s midfielder Bernardo Rosa wants his side to maintain their focus for the full 90 minutes of Saturday’s fixture at home to Everton.
After suffering a midweek loss in the Papa John’s Trophy, a 1-0 defeat at Colchester United where an early lapse in concentration cost the Hammers dear, Rosa has preached the importance of maintaining constant intensity within games.
West Ham’s U23s go into Saturday’s game in midtable in Premier League 2 Division 1, but other results on Friday evening mean that three points against the Toffees would see them rise to third in the standings.
Rosa is therefore hoping his team dispense with any errors and put their best foot forward in the match, which will be played behind-closed-doors at Rush Green Stadium, kicking off at 3pm.
Discussing Tuesday’s defeat, Rosa explained: “We didn’t play as well as against Ipswich Town earlier in the season [a 2-1 win], but we still had some chances.
“They didn’t have a lot of chances but the chance that Colchester had, they scored, and that’s it basically. We know we need to be better for the next game so we can keep progressing.
“That’s what is letting us down this season – our mistakes. We’re playing well but a few mistakes here and there are costing us points. We’ve got to learn from that, and in the next few games, we’re going to improve on that.
“We had a couple of chances and didn’t capitalise on them, but it happens in football. We’re going to be better at this so we can win our next games.”
Now in his third campaign of regular development football, the versatile 21-year-old is one of the more experienced members of Dmitri Halajko's development squad.
Channeling that, Rosa also discussed the importance of remaining positive within matches and letting that feed into their natural games.
He added: “We’ve been training really well. Everyone is training really well and that’s the kind of group we are – it’s a nice group of lads.
“We need to just be better with the ball and keep our positive mentality going, and we can get a better result against Everton.”
West Ham United U23s’ match against Everton U23s will be played behind-closed-doors at Rush Green Stadium on Saturday 2 October, kicking off at 3pm. Only key personnel and invited guests will be admitted.
You can follow the game with our live blog on whufc.com from 2.30pm and Twitter updates, and there will be post-match reaction and highlights pieces available over Saturday evening and Sunday morning.
