Slaven Bilic promised to take the ignition provided by Carabao Cup heroics into a potentially decisive weekend for his West Ham United tenure. His side scored three times in 15 minutes to reach the quarter-finals at Tottenham Hotspur’s expense, after which Bilic promised the second-half performance would provide “a standard” for Saturday’s Premier League make-or-break match against Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park.
“Wins give you energy and they give you freshness. Now tomorrow at training there will be no long faces, nobody’s going to feel tired because of the fact of this result, especially in such a good game.” Asked what he had said to his players at half-time, Bilic said he had told one of his strikers to be “braver” and to work harder. Certainly there was a marked upsurge in André Ayew, who scored twice and hurled his body into the fray.
“We scored a goal, we gained energy and all our crosses started to be world-class crosses, very hard to defend,” Bilic said. “We scored the first, then the second and suddenly it’s you who is in charge. The lads deserve it, it’s a great night for the club.
“Take out the Brighton game, we’ve improved a lot in the last six games. This should be the standard from us in terms of competitiveness, team play and fighting for the team. Some games you will lose but I am quite positive now. We improved a lot and we should use this as a standard from here.”
Bilic was at pains to point out his players had won the game, rather than Tottenham’s had lost it, although he suggested there was an attitude of “job done” for Mauricio Pochettino’s team when they were 2-0 up. Pochettino suggested Spurs had lost their “agressivity” after the first half, blaming team rotation, but admitted the result might also affect very slightly his planning for Manchester United this weekend.
“I think we allowed them to come back to the game. First half, I think was under control, I think we played well, scored 2-0, and I know, we are so disappointed, so difficult to explain,” Pochettino said. “In football, after a few weeks when we were in the sky, this can happen. The performances against Real and Liverpool were fantastic. I think we spent a lot of energy in the last two games, and so it is difficult to keep up that type of level. It’s just more difficult to play in these type of competitions when you rotate, and to keep momentum. It’s not easy to remain at the same level.”