Despite goalkeeper Łukasz Fabiański’s impressive performance against former club Arsenal, West Ham United slipped to a 2-0 defeat at Emirates Stadium – but the experienced No1 preached calmness in the situation.
The home side proved the more potent attacking outlet on the evening, with only several excellent blocks from defender Craig Dawson and an outstanding save from Fabiański – who scrambled across his goal to turn Kieran Tierney’s looping volley onto the bar – preventing Arsenal from holding a half-time lead.
Struggling to establish a foothold in the game, West Ham’s task was made all the more difficult when Vladimír Coufal collected a contentious second yellow card – only for Fabiański to dive across to his left to keep out Alexandre Lacazette’s subsequent penalty kick.
In the end, however, clinical finishes from Gabriel Martinelli and Emile Smith Rowe either side of his spot-kick heroics left Fabiański with little chance and saw the Hammers slip to fifth in the Premier League table.
“It was very difficult,” the 36-year-old admitted. “I think you could see right from the start that Arsenal were trying to put a lot of pressure on us, and I think we struggled with that pressure.
“We were giving a lot of balls away when we tried to playout from the back, but I think we got punished because of that – being a little bit sloppy with the ball and not matching the energy of Arsenal.
“Sometimes, you’re going to get periods in the game and then you’re going to get over them and get better, but tonight it never really happened for us.
“After the red card, we still kind of stayed in the game until we conceded the second goal. Obviously, we didn’t create much, but being 1-0 down always gives you a chance to maybe get something out of the game.
“To be honest, I think we should’ve been a bit more resilient and tried not to concede a second goal, because then you can always get a set-piece or something like that and maybe have a chance to equalise. Once we conceded a second goal, that was more or less it.”
A challenging evening for David Moyes’ Irons in general showcased Fabiański at the former Poland international’s very best, with his saves from Tierney and Lacazette particularly impressive.
The goalkeeper recalled: “As soon as I saw him [Tierney] getting ready to take a shot, I was trying to get set to get there as quickly as possible.
“Obviously it was a difficult one, because it was looping so it had a bit of a height to it and it was always going up to the top corner, so I just tried to move my feet as quickly as I could and get something on it, which I managed to do.
“To be honest with you, I had a bit of fun first with Martinelli and then Lacazette, asking who wanted to take the penalty, because I don’t think they were quite sure at that moment.
“As always, it comes down to your prep before the game to analyse possible penalty takers. I always pay attention to that, and I think that helped me today as well with that penalty.”
Despite the defeat, the Hammers are just one point off the UEFA Champions League places and, given the nature of many of their early-season performances, are still a force to be reckoned with in the Premier League when they inevitably recapture their best form.
“There is a strong belief,” Fabiański declared. “We lost the game and, as always, there are bad emotions after losing a game and not performing well.
“But then we’ve played against some really good teams this season, and we’ve managed to beat them, so we can take confidence from that.
“Obviously, it’s a bad result tonight, we have to admit that, but if you look at the season so far, it has been really good.
“You’re always going to get setbacks and I believe that, sometimes setbacks like that help you to put your mindset back on the right track.
“I think we have a good opportunity on Saturday to put in a very strong performance, playing at home [against Norwich].
“You know, every team’s going to go through this. It’s not always nice. There’s always up and downs and the teams who finish high in the table are the ones who have less of them, so I hope we’re going to stay consistent.
“It’s still quite early in the season. You shouldn’t really be worried about looking too far ahead. I think we have to focus now on coming back against Norwich on Saturday. “