Conor Coventry said West Ham United did a professional job to secure a 3-1 UEFA Europa Conference League play-off round first leg win over Viborg FF on Thursday evening.
The Hammers were pushed hard by their Danish opponents in front of 30,000 fans at London Stadium, but showed good levels of professionalism to secure a two-goal first-leg advantage to take to Jutland.
Gianluca Scamacca headed in from fellow full debutant Maxwel Cornet to give the Irons the lead before the break, before second-half goals from Jarrod Bowen and Michail Antonio put the Premier League side in control of the tie, despite Jacob Bonde’s header.
“It was an enjoyable night,” the Republic of Ireland U21 captain told West Ham TV. “I think we played a good side. They really like to play and you could see they had a good structure about them, so it's important we got the win.
“Obviously, it's a bit of a banana peel up here and it was really important to have got the win and now we've got to finish it off over there.
“Most games you’d take being two goals up at half-time. We could have defended the goal a bit better and obviously we didn’t want to concede like that, but it’s a good start I guess. We’ve got a bit to do, and we’ll be focused.”
With a vociferous home crowd behind them at their own Viborg Arena next week, Coventry knows the Londoners will need to be on their game again to complete the job and reach the group stage.
“I was just speaking to one of their coaches and he said their fans are really good and they're so passionate to be here and you can see that. It made for a good spectacle to see them there and I’m looking forward to a different environment, different atmosphere and I can only learn from it.”
For Coventry himself, a European debut was welcome reward for a productive loan spell at MK Dons and a positive approach to pre-season on his return to West Ham.
“I was buzzing!” he smiled. “As I’ve said before, I just really wanted the opportunity to play and just obviously for it to be here at home was even better. I really enjoyed it. It was a tough test, but yeah, I really loved it.
“I did alright! There are still a lot of things I can improve on, and I think there were some nice passages. I thought I did OK, but I'm not happy with that and I still have a lot more I'd like to do.
“I’d love to play again next week, so we’ll see what happens.”
