David Moyes was a happy manager after his West Ham United side secured a 1-0 Premier League win at Fulham that was the epitome of resilience and character.
Four days after being embarrassed in their own stadium by Newcastle United, when they slumped to an error-strewn 5-1 defeat, the Irons were defensively flawless at Craven Cottage.
Moyes’ much-changed side made an incredible 60 clearances and 15 interceptions and blocked eleven goal-bound shots to secure their second away league win of the season and climb to 13th in the table on 30 points.
For the first time since beating AFC Bournemouth on 24 October, the Hammers have more points than games played, and with three points and a superior goal difference now separating them from the bottom three, the manager can look forward to Thursday’s UEFA Europa Conference League quarter-final first leg at Belgian Cup holders KAA Gent with renewed optimism.
Saturday’s win was settled by Harrison Reed’s own-goal, which went in off the midfielder’s heel from Jarrod Bowen’s cross following Declan Rice’s cleverly-taken free-kick.
While possession was scarce, it was West Ham who had the better chances to score throughout, with Declan Rice, Danny Ings and Maxwel Cornet, in added-time, all being denied the opportunity to add to the visitors’ lead by Fulham goalkeeper Bernd Leno.
At the other end, Łukasz Fabiański was impeccable and yet again showed mental fortitude following a difficult midweek. All in all, it was a display that proved, as Aaron Cresswell said pre-match, that this group is together and committed to getting the Club out of the predicament it finds itself in.
When you’re in trouble, you need to find a way to get results and you need defenders who know how to do their jobs and know what their responsibilities and requirements are and I thought the boys did that really well today.
Those defensive numbers tell me that the boys did their jobs, but also that we need to play better because I’m not hiding that fact.
West Ham have been in this position and I’ve been in this position twice before as manager [after taking over in mid-season].
When I came in as manager nobody was that bothered about how we played; they were only bothered about us getting the wins to make sure we were a Premier League club.
We did it then and I’m sure we will do it this time as well.
The result was all-important, as it is in any game.
This is only our second [Premier League win] away from home and it’s our second win in a week.
We’ve taken six points out of nine this week, so it’s not a bad return.
I’ve got a European game now which we’re all excited about. We want to be in Europe and we’re going into another game, so for us to have started in Europe in August and still be in it in April is terrific.
The players I called into the team certainly turned up.
But we were always making changes today because the first two games this week against Southampton and Newcastle, we only changed one player, so we knew getting to the third game in six days, it was nearly going to be impossible to go with the same players.
No matter what the result was in midweek, we’d be changing the team, and I think we’ve got players who you could decide there is not an awful lot between them.
Also, the ones [I called in] today, I knew them well and they knew me well, I trusted them and I thought they did everything I wanted them to do.
I think having the two boys up front gave us a different look, but it was also a problem because we couldn’t dominate the game, and that’s why we had to defend so many shots etcetera, because we had so many players on the front line.
In the end, it gave us a chance to get the goal and it helped us in the first half, especially.
We could have scored more goals and I agree we had the better chances. Even Maxi’s at the end, he had the chance to finish it off, so I’m disappointed we didn’t get the second, but I’m thrilled that we got one!
