Having bounced back from an early goal on Tuesday, West Ham United's performance in the 4-1 win over Watford typified many of the Irons' displays over a brilliant calendar year: defensively sound, offensively thrilling, and full of clinical finishing.
West Ham United captain Mark Noble - making his first Premier League start of the season at Vicarage Road, and scoring a crucial third goal from the penalty spot to put his side 3-1 ahead early in the second half - was at the heart of that display.
That strike added to quickfire goals midway through the first half for Tomáš Souček and Said Benrahma, cancelling out Emmanuel Dennis' early opener for Watford, before Nikola Vlašić's first goal in West Ham colours arrived deep into injury time to the Irons' collective jubilation.
Speaking to the television cameras at the full-time whistle, Noble discussed a West Ham performance of control, style - and a goal which saw the skipper move level with Paolo di Canio to sit second in the Hammers' all-time Premier League scoring charts on 47...
After playing two days ago, and with Watford not having had a game for a couple of weeks now, it was a tough ask for us to come here today.
Obviously we had Dec [Rice] missing and a few players out. Three of our back four have been out in the last month or so, so to come here and get the victory today was very important, and it was a really good performance, especially in the first half.
All in all, I think today was really important. We’ve had a tough run of games, and also a tough run of results, so we needed to get back to winning ways to stay up there in that top half, and today I thought we were really good, especially the boys that came in. I thought they did really well today.
It has been tough for us. We’ve had a lot of games. The only one I think we missed was Norwich, which was postponed, but I think sometimes it’s better to keep going.
That showed today, them having a break, but the boys looked strong. Even though Said Benrahma and Jarrod Bowen played two days ago, they looked fantastic, and it was a really good performance.
The crowd were really up for it today – you could feel that – and they hadn’t seen a lot of football.
I thought we really rallied from the opening goal, with the way we got back into the game. I thought we controlled it for the first half.
It felt like we had control of the game, kept it moving, had one or two chances, kept putting balls in the box… Apart from that opening five minutes, I think we had control of the game. They looked pretty dangerous on the counter-attack, but I think the boys controlled the game well, pushed on and we won it comfortably.
Watford rallied a little bit in the second half and put our centre halves under some pressure, but all in all, it was comfortable.
Manuel Lanzini naturally drops and wants to get on the ball, so we said to Tomáš Souček, who scored our first goal, to get on the ball and do what he naturally does.
Obviously I say the same to Dec when I play with Dec because he’s so good at going forward as well as protecting the back four. I thought there was a nice balance in there today and Mikey Antonio coming back gives us a massive lift.
All in all, it was a good day, and now we’ve a few days rest before we play at Crystal Palace.
It was fantastic to score for myself, but today, at 2-1 up, getting a penalty, and having to wait so long to take it...
It was an important goal for us because it gave us a two-goal buffer.
I’m just glad it hit the back of the net, I could celebrate with the fans and we could get the three points.
David Moyes has brought an organisation, a set way of playing.
I think he’s got an incredible way of getting players to do things they normally don’t want to do. I think he’s rallied the Club and the fans.
We’ve had a little bit of a dip but every team’s going to go through that, but today was massive for us, and then going to Crystal Palace on Saturday is going to be another big game.
We’ve got a really good squad of players. We want to keep pushing, keep testing and making the players we’ve got here play even better.
I think we’re defensively solid most weeks, we’ve got good attacking players who create – like today – and can score goals. It’s really important that we’ve got players who can come on and score, like Nicki Vlašić who's a great lad, and everyone chips in with goals here.
I still think we can play better – we’ve got Declan to come back, Angelo Ogbonna, Aaron Cresswell, Big Kurt Zouma…
I think top six, with the way we’ve started, is our goal this season.