When West Ham plays Burnley later today, manager David Moyes acknowledges he hopes to see an improvement in his team’s defensive play.
The Hammers are set to face Burnley at Turf Moor in their return to domestic football after the international break, buoyed by a significant victory against Nottingham Forest at the London Stadium.
David Moyes, the team’s manager, aims to carry the positive momentum from the last win into the upcoming match against Burnley, a team currently at the bottom of the league and yet to secure a home win in their six top-flight fixtures. Moyes is optimistic that West Ham can capitalize on Burnley’s struggles in home games.
However, Moyes openly acknowledges his disappointment with the team’s defensive performance this season, conceding that an increased openness in their style of play has contributed to conceding more goals.
Despite the attacking intent, Moyes emphasizes the need to strike a balance by reinforcing the defense, stating, “We’re trying to play slightly more open and perhaps in turn that has caused us to concede more goals, which I’m really disappointed about. But that is the balance you have to find. You want to bring in more attacking players but without conceding more. It’s something we need to focus on and do a better job defensively.”
Moyes is mindful of the challenging fixture schedule ahead, acknowledging the difficulty of managing both domestic and European commitments. Expressing the team’s ambition to succeed in both arenas, Moyes emphasizes the need for careful management, stating, “With the schedule we have coming up, it’s going to be a really difficult thing to manage.
It’s difficult to answer how we will do it, and I wish someone would take a look at it because that might help us. We’re thrilled to be involved in European football and we want to challenge in the Premier League and try to have good runs in the cup competitions. If you want to do all that then it’s a punishing schedule. We’ll go with it, take every game as it comes, and do as well as we can.”
