West Ham manager Slaven Bilic feared the same fate as sacked Frank de Boer after transfer dispute with chairman

• e-mail

West Ham boss Slaven Bilic insists his relationship with chairman David Sullivan is fine.

But that did not stop Bilic fearing he was heading for the same fate as Frank de Boer at Crystal Palace had his side lost a fourth straight match.

As it was, second-half goals from Pedro Obiang - via a huge deflection - and Andre Ayew secured a 2-0 win over Huddersfield and West Ham's first points of the season.

Slaven Bilic admitted he feared he would be dismissed in the same manner as Frank de Boer

De Boer was fired by Crystal Palace on Monday after just four games and 77 days

The build-up to the game was dominated by Bilic's dispute with joint-owner Sullivan over West Ham's dealings - or lack of them - on deadline day.

Bilic had said Sullivan 'likes to talk' after the joint-owner, involved in a row with Sporting Lisbon over a failed move for William Carvalho, claimed the Croatian had turned down the chance to sign Renato Sanches and Grzegorz Krychowiak.

And the pressure was cranked up further on Monday with the news that Palace had axed de Boer following their fourth consecutive defeat.

The Croatian was edging closer to the sack following three straight league defeats this season

Pedro Obiang opened the scoring for the Hammers in their 2-0 win over Huddersfield Town

But Bilic insisted: 'I never said a bad word about the chairman and I never will.

'Yes I said some things - at the end of the day I'm 49 - I said them, and I wasn't drunk!

'I said nothing bad about the chairman, on the contrary I said we did good business, we wanted one more player and that the story from Sporting is not true as far as I know. I defended him.

'Was de Boer's sacking on my mind? It was, I ain't going to lie. I've been in football since I was 18, so I know.

Andre Ayew scored West Ham's second goal in their much-needed victory over the Terriers

Bilic celebrates after Monday night's win at the London Stadium

'To be fair I came to the zone where I don't care about that, but not in a negative way, I care about the team and that's what I've been focused on. The other things are irrelevant.'

Tom Ince hit the crossbar for Huddersfield but they slipped to their first loss of the season and boss David Wagner admitted: 'It was a deserved defeat.

'The positive thing is we have another game on Saturday (against Leicester). But I don't like defeats and I don't take positives out of them.'