West Ham United manager David Moyes was disappointed to see his side bow out of the Emirates FA Cup on Saturday afternoon.
The Hammers fell behind to an early goal by Championship leaders West Bromwich Albion, and were unable to mount a recovery in the remainder of the match.
While West Ham struggled for attacking fluency, the well-drilled visitors did well to keep their hosts at bay for 80 minutes – and Moyes demanded improvement from his side moving forwards.
On the result…
“I’m disappointed we’re out of the Cup. I wouldn’t say we did all we could, but we tried to do what we could to get through, and unfortunately we weren’t good enough on the day.”
On West Ham’s difficulties creating shooting opportunities…
“Sometimes that can be taken the wrong way. I think we worked hard to try and get into positions but West Brom defended really well.
“We need to get more shots on target and attempt to get more away, but we just couldn’t find a way through at times, especially late on in the second half.”
On the three substitutions he made at half-time…
“We passed the ball away, we kicked it out the pitch, we couldn’t play, we never really had any attacks. We gave up too many opportunities, I felt, to West Brom in the first half.
“There were too many things I didn’t like and I felt that if we were going to have the chance of getting through or getting a draw then I might as well make the changes then.”
On Mark Noble’s injury-time chance…
“I have to say that it’s amazing it’s [fallen to] Mark Noble, that we haven’t got other people free, or big opportunities to the forward players we had on the pitch.
“We started with two strikers, and in the second half we played with three front players, so overall it was disappointing we didn’t do more.”
On the prospect of bringing players in during the transfer window…
“It’s important, but it’s only important if you get the right ones. You can bring people in who can give you a name, but more importantly if you don’t get the right ones for the [right] positions then sometimes you’re better not having anybody.
“We’ve played with what we have in the squad today but we used every player available to us, so we could do with adding if it’s right - but again, only if it is right.”
On the rest of the season ahead…
“We were in the bottom three when I took over in my first game, so we know the difficult task we’ve got ahead, but we now know that we’re focusing on the Premier League.
“I’m disappointed for the supporters that I couldn’t give them a better Cup run. I thought this game today gave us an opportunity to get through at home. We went relatively strong with our team but our performance today didn’t merit it.”