Nuno Santo believes that West Ham are going to be safe from relegation if they repeat the performance at Chelsea last weekend - even though the Hammers ended up on the losing side.
The Head Coach, speaking to the media ahead of Saturday's massive six-pointer against Burnley at Turf Moor admitted that he had been delighted with his team's recent form - but insisted that they need to emulate the efforts at Stamford Bridge if they are to avoid the drop.You may read every word Nuno said during his pre-match presser about the trip to the north west below...
Q: Afternoon, Nuno. Apart from the usual kind of knocks picked up from the game, is there any kind of major team news, because it would appear you have a fully fit squad at the moment?
NES: Yeah, like you said, some problems that we have to assess. We still have tomorrow, players that we need to see carefully and then decide - with the exception of JC, but he's going to be out because of the red card. Everyone else is available. Yeah. Hopefully, yeah.
Q: Last week I asked you about transfers. You said there were negotiations going on, so it sounded like there was a lot maybe happening. In the end, only one player came through since then, Axel Disasi; were you disappointed not to get a few more through the door?
NES: Look, we brought players that we can see made sense to us in terms of rebalancing our squad. The players that came in, I think they can help. Of course, there were other things going on but it's a very tricky, window to operate in. We had this idea, but I think we have a committed squad now. And we have to move forward, of course. It's not always perfect, but the main reason is that I think we've been able to rebalance our squad and become competitive.
Q: Because I guess losing Lucas Paqueta, I don't think that was part of something you wanted and you would have got a lot of money through for him. I think the club ended up making a profit in the end, in the window. Fans might look at that and think, you know, we really need to get out of this situation, but what would you say in that respect is kind of not spending the money and also making a profit?
NES: Yeah, the situation with Lucas that happened was, as everybody's aware, something that was difficult to do. I think, in the end, everybody looked for the better solution but like you said, and I insist on this, we have to realise that you can have targets but those targets are in other clubs and is not only what you want, is what the other clubs do also.
So our fans must understand that it's not that the January transfer window is very difficult to operate, it's more about rebalancing and understanding what we need for the last matches of the season. And I'm totally convinced that we're going to be OK. So this I can tell our fans: we are positive, we are working, we are committed, we are aware of the situation and the responsibility that is on us.
Q: Are you happier now than where you were at the start of January?
NES: I'm never happy! It's always a difficult situation to say that you are happy because we cannot be happy with what's happening. We cannot be happy after the game that we played [at Chelsea] and you didn't get any points, so I'm not happy.
Q: In terms of your squad though, are you happier with where it is now? And do you feel like you have rebalanced the squad?
NES: Yes, definitely. We rebalanced the squad. We have options and the players are committed - and that, more than anything, is important.
Q: With Axel Disasi. Why him and what does he bring?
NES: He's been working, he's in a good place physically. He's been working physically at Chelsea. His heart, I think is good. Now he has to get inside of the team, know his team mates. But I think he can help us, he's a strong defender, good on the ball, a good option.
Q: Is he ready to to play if needed? Because obviously he hasn't played for Chelsea in a while?
NES: Yeah, that's what we're assessing and will decide tomorrow.
Q: Todibo's red card. After the game, you said you wanted to see it?
NES: Yeah, I saw it. I saw it. It was a mistake. First of all, he was the first one to recognise that it was a mistake, unfortunately now we're going to be without him for a couple of games. We're going to miss him, but he realise that he'd made a mistake. The message is, we cannot afford to have mistakes - especially of this nature, disciplinary mistakes that take options away from us.
Q: A lot happened in that moment. Did you think he was a bit unlucky to be the only one [sent off]?
NES: Yeah, it was a big mess going on. Both clubs have been charged. A lot of our players and Chelsea's players lost their temper.
Q: It was such a good first half, I think everyone could see that. Obviously the second-half got away from you a little bit and I know you would have done your analysis so is there anything - because you spoke about what you thought the team should done differently in terms of defending crosses - as a manager, that you thought after reflection that you could have done differently?
NES: Of course we analysed it. Every time we make a change, we try to change it to create an impact, a better solution - and sometimes things don't go well. Then you have to realise that you probably made a mistake. This is what it is.
Q: With Kilman coming on for Pablo, was that...
NES: No, it's not about names, it's about how we wanted to close the game down. We felt that the team was going through a difficult spell. After the first half we felt that we'd spent a lot of energy pressing high and playing such good, offensive football. After 55-60 minutes we felt this energy went away and we wanted to rebalance the team, have an extra body [in defence]. Didn't work out.
Q: Pablo and Taty, because they're so energetic they've given the team so much energy, but I don't know if you can ask them to do it for 90 minutes?
NES: It's impossible. Not only Tati and Pablo, all of us - all of us have to realise playing away from home the way we did in the first half took a lot of our energy out of us.
Q: Is it always going to be a problem now for you, though? Something you have to figure out is when those two, you know, when they've done 60 or 70 minutes - how do you adapt? Is that something you're thinking about?
NES: Yeah, I'm thinking about the next solution which can help us and get us through the games.
Q: After the positivity of the results against Spurs and Sunderland, mentally how much of a set back was that defeat against Chelsea and the manner of it?
NES: It still hurts for everybody because we felt that the game was ours to take. So it still hurts, but we move forward. On the positives, we played really good football. It's almost like saying let's keep these standards for all the remaining games of the season with our standards there. If we play this good, we're going to be OK.
Q: Is that the message you've been sending to your players this week?
NES: Yes. And they know. Of course, after the disappointment you still have to grieve. You still have to feel it, it still hurts. But we are ready to go and make these high standards again in our game.
Q: You're coming up against Burnley, who are in a similar situation, but they haven't won for 15 games. So when you go into this, do you feel that you're the team with more reason to be optimistic?
NES: We're never going to feel this because it's always going to be very tough. Burnley is a good team fighting for the same objective at their home [ground]. It's a tough game ahead of us, we know we have to be ready.
Q: What do you see as the main threats from that Burnley team?
NES: All over. We played them here at London Stadium and they were very hard. You just have to look at the message from Scott Parker at the end of the game [against Sunderland], or Kyle Walker's. They say they're going to react and we have to be ready for that.
Q: With West Ham, you've lost I think 18 points from winning positions this season. How can you address that? Is that a tactical thing? Is a mental thing?
NES: We are trying to find the right solution. It's frustrating to know that we normally start the games so well and then cannot sustain them, or close the games down. It's frustrating, but we are trying to find solutions.
Q: Just finally from the big match for yourselves, obviously Leeds and Nottingham Forest play each other before?
NES: That we cannot control.
Q: Have you got a preferred result?
NES: No. We have to focus on ourselves. What's happening In other stadiums you cannot control. We have to do our job.
Q: I know managers always tell me the next game is the biggest game, but this feels like a six-pointer. It feels like whoever wins will have some momentum to go into the last 15/16 games this season and whoever doesn't, is going to really struggle?
NES: Yeah, there's a lot of football to be played, but it's a very important game. Definitely. We have to realise this game means a lot for us and react from what happened against Chelsea. We have to react. So I expect that from the players.
Q: How do you convince the players to block out the second-half at Chelsea and just focus on what they did so well in the first?
NES: You cannot block it out, you cannot ignore it. What we have to do is analyse, together, what we did wrong so that can not open again. But I think we've talked a lot already about the game. What I say to the players is let's try to sustain these levels of performance through all of the game.
Q: Seven goals in the last three games...
NES: It's very positive...
Q: Very positive. No clean sheets is all...
NES: That's negative!
Q: How do you solve that?
NES: Keep being offensive, keep scoring and try [to keep] a clean sheet, though for that maybe we have to find other solutions. This is what we are doing and the players are working on that.
Q: You're a good football manager. You know that you can't go into a game every week knowing you have to score two or three goals per game?
NES: It's impossible. Impossible. We have to defend properly. When we score two goals away from home, normally It's our game to take.
Q: In terms of that, you don't want to take anything away from the attacking players. I know that defending starts with the forward players, so how do you get that balance?
NES: It's hard. Knowing that the way we are defending now, the way our defensive shape is high, requires a lot of energy, requires a lot of running, covering. There will be a moment that you cannot control when, for example, Chelsea put five players on the last line. We have to drop our lines and defend the box and that is our main issue. I think we should defend our box properly and better.
Q: You bought some players in in January: Pablo, Castellanos, Adama and Disasi. None of those - certainly the first two, nor the last two - have had to be involved in proper relegation battles. Roll up your sleeves because every single point matters. So in terms of that, how...
NES: I don't understand what you're trying to say. Explain to me?
Q: Obviously you're going to need players now. Some of them might have been through this before, some might have the experience of going through huge games where every single point, every single minute of every single game matters. How do you get across - especially the two lads that come in from abroad - that this is properly..?
NES: They realise already. They realise that and they realised even before they joined us. You have to be brave to join a club in the situation that we are in. They've shown this purpose, this commitment to go, to come here and help so I'm positive they are already aware of the fight that we are involved in.
* Something to say about this story? Please visit the KUMB Forum to leave a comment.
