West Ham United David Moyes was visibly pleased in his post-match interview after seeing his side claim a monumental three points against Fulham at Craven Cottage.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!It was an extremely important London derby for the Hammers, who would have been left joint-third-bottom with a loss, but ultimately climbed to 13th place with a big win.
Moyes has been under growing pressure recently with his team getting thrashed 5-1 by Newcastle at the London Stadium last Saturday, but this win will no doubt pause the speculation over his future.
The deciding goal came from a Harrison Reed own goal in the 23rd minute, after Jarrod Bowen fired a dangerous cross across the Fulham six-yard box, which deflected off the midfielder and into Bernd Leno’s net.
The Hammers came under intense pressure from the Cottagers, especially in the second half, but solid performances from Lukasz Fabianski and the whole back four ensured they kept a big clean sheet.
In his post-match interview, Moyes focused on the defensive performance of his team and how a change of formation helped West Ham get the win.
Speaking to BBC Sport, Moyes said: “We had a clean sheet against Southampton last weekend, the midweek game [against Newcastle] was a freak show.
“Hopefully that won’t happen again and when you look back at it you would probably say that shouldn’t happen again, it doesn’t happen to professionals too often.
“But a great bounce back from the players today, we had to dig deep, we stuck at it, we changed a few things things around and thankfully it worked for us today.”
Indeed, Moyes opted to change his shape for the game, dropping his generally defensive approach for a more attacking, no-nonsense 4-4-2 formation.
On the change of system, Moyes said: “It helped us in the early part of the game, we knew we wanted to get the ball forward and into the forward players if we could.
I have to say, Fulham made it difficult, they controlled the ball very well from their centre-backs and made it difficult. I always thought if we could get the ball into Danny Ings and Michail Antonio they would cause problems.
“I know today it was Jarrod [Bowen] and I think it was an own goal in the end by all accounts but it was really good work and after that it was a really good performance so that we didn’t concede.”
“We had a bit of luck and sometimes you have to make a bit of luck. We didn’t have any midweek but there was a brilliant save from Lukasz [Fabianski] when [Andreas] Pereira went through.
“We could have wrapped it up for 2-0, too, with Maxwel Cornet at the end and there were chances to get a goal.
“Two clean sheets in a week, won two games 1-0, so I think when you’re in this position in the league, you have to win games.
“It might not always be the best. We would like to be playing better and much higher from a league position but we’re not so that’s where you have to understand how it is and find a way of getting your results.”
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