Is there any update on Craig Dawson and Angelo Ogbonna after they went off last night?
No, because you are early this morning so we have not really got any update on where we were last night. We were just getting our bits and pieces together and getting ready to train.
Have the illnesses suffered by Michail Antonio and Kurt Zouma improved at all?
[Michail] Antonio is a little bit better, Kurt [Zouma] felt a bit of the sniffles, so we will have to see how he is as well. I’ve not had the chance to see him this morning. Hopefully, they will have a chance.
Are you short at the back, with Thilo Kehrer suffering from a knock as well?
The Thilo [Kehrer] situation is probably more of a precaution more than anything. We hope he’s going to be fine, we expect him to be okay.
Maxwel Cornet is set to miss out, but are you expecting him to return against Liverpool next week.
Difficult, he’s had a small calf strain and obviously sometimes, you can get rid of them quite quickly. Sometimes, they don’t, so we’ve got to be careful with him. He’s not available for the next game and that is Southampton.
What is your reaction to the news that four police officers were injured during the crowd trouble in the win over Anderlecht?
We certainly don’t want police officers getting injured, that is for sure. I think we spoke enough about it last night, I don’t think we need to give it any more time but obviously, I totally understand that police officers got injured, that is not good and certainly something we don’t want.
Four wins in a row now, how pleased are you with the progress you have made in recent games?
I am really pleased, we’ve got a little something going again. We’re back winning and getting back to ourselves, that is the most important thing, I am still looking for improvements in different areas and improvements at different parts of the game at different times, so I think there is room for that to get better as well, which is a good sign. Always in football, winning will be the most important thing and hopefully, we can keep that going.
You face a Southampton side who have lost all of their last four games, but your recent meetings have been tight. What do you make of them?
I think Southampton over the years, we’ve done quite well against them and recently, they’ve done quite well against us. I think that it’s like that but I think the Premier League at the moment, I say probably most weeks in press conferences, the games are very tight. Very difficult to make assumptions of exactly how the games are going to go and there doesn’t look like there’s an awful lot between the teams. There’s obviously three or four at the top that are very good, then after that, maybe on any day, any one team can win.
How do you assess Ralph Hasenhuttl’s time in the Premier League so far?
I’d be the wrong man to ask about Southampton and Ralph Hasenhuttl, that would be something which you would ask other people. Overall, he’s a very experienced manager, he’s had some great successes with Southampton, so we have a difficult game against them, we always have had.
How pleased are you to have secured a place in the knockout rounds of a European competition for a second straight season?
Really pleased because I think we’ve probably played as many games, if not more, than anybody in Europe as far as qualifiers. Obviously, we got to the semi-finals last year, we had all of the group stage games. I think for us being relatively newcomers to it in the last couple of years, we are making a pretty good go of it. Obviously we would have liked to have got to the final and we would like to do everything we can to have a run in the Conference League as well. I’ve said to the players as well, every cup competition we are in, we want to try and have a go at winning it, we feel as if we are a good side and on our day, we could match most teams.
In what ways do you think you have been able to help the confidence and development of Jarrod Bowen? What are the next steps for him?
Getting a real consistency. He’s maybe just started a little bit slower, but I think he’s back close to his form now. He looks as if he’s going to score more in situations, he looks as if he’s going to create goals as well at the moment. Generally, I think he’s feeling much better and he’s probably in a much better condition now than he was right at the start. I think it was difficult for a lot of players to come back after the length of the season last year, also the international games. Jarrod looks as if he’s coming back into good form.
In terms of Southampton, what do you make of Southampton so far? Are you still trying to figure out their rhythm and identity?
It’s not my job to figure out their rhythm or their identity. My job is to get a good rhythm here at West Ham, make sure we keep trying to improve on our identity while bringing in new players. Southampton is not my department.
How pleased were you with getting back-to-back league wins against Wolverhampton Wanderers and Fulham in your last two games?
I think we needed it. We’re not daft, we knew we needed to get a couple of wins, we got them but we felt there were some mitigating circumstances at the start of the season why maybe we were a little bit behind it. Ultimately, we were beginning to get players back. Last week, I think apart from Nayef Aguerd and Maxwel Cornet. Last week was probably the closest we’ve had to having a sort of full squad available to us. I think when we get that, we are a good team and I think we will get better as the season goes on.
Are there lessons to be learned with Jarrod Bowen with the summer and pre-season as it was his first as an international player?
I think there is. The year before, we’d had quite a short break, Jarrod had said he had gone home, back to Hereford to be with his family. I said ‘what were you doing?’ He said ‘I just went running, I was running in the potato fields and all over Hereford’ and he came back in incredible condition and went on. He started the season great, actually in the end, probably his form from January onwards, we needed his goals. I actually think he got himself in such a good physical condition, he was ready to start. I think the difference was probably the length of the season, away with the international break then saying he needed a break, which he did do. I think it’s just taking him time to get up and running again. I just think of the season before after England were in the final of the European Championships, Harry Kane had a slow start to the season but that went on to be fantastic in the second half of the season. It was probably because of fatigue, the games, not enough recovery. I’m hoping it is a little bit of the sign, but I’m beginning to see a lot of good signs from Jarrod now.
What do you think has improved about him since his time with you?
I think Jarrod has started to show in his development, you can see an improvement in him. His technical part of the game looks better. He’s faster and quicker than he’s been and he’s understanding a lot more tactically, what his roles have to do. I see Jarrod, if you think of the best wingers, it might not be the right terminology, I think of all of the best wingers over the years, you have your Ronaldos and Messis nearly all of them became centre-forwards and goalscorers and I think Jarrod is going towards that and his career is going on, getting more towards being a forward player who wants to score. If you look at his goals last year and to be fair, if you look at his goals every year, his goals at [Hull] over two/three years, he has a really good goalscoring record over the years and for us, he’s been really consistent as well.
What is he like to work with?
He is a really good boy to work with. Wants to listen, wants to watch his clips back, wants to do the debriefs, wants to see what he can improve on, wants to look at his runs, wants to look at what he can do better. He’s a really diligent boy and trying to improve his game. If you looked at him, you can see that over the last two or three years, he has certainly improved his game. I said to him that if he scores five or six goals before now and World Cup, he would have a chance of going to the World Cup. I think he’s given himself a real chance at the moment because he’s getting some goals and his form is improving greatly.
Is that five or six goals from now or when you came back from the international break?
I said five or six goals from then, because it’s not an easy thing to do. He’s got a couple of goals already, so let’s hope he can keep it going.
