West Ham are on a high after beating Brighton 1 – 0 at their new stadium. Brighton had been in imperious form in their new digs so it was an excellent result to turn them over although it was a very hard fought victory.

Sam Allardyce paid tribute to the defensive resilience of his West Ham United after a dogged display was enough to earn all three points.

Kevin Nolan’s solitary strike on 17 minutes settled the contest. West Ham though were missing the creativity of David Bentley, Matt Taylor and Henri Lansbury to injury and had to give away much in terms of possession. The likes of the recalled Mark Noble and Jack Collison to work overtime in midfield.

“It was an outstanding victory for us at a very difficult place to play,” Big Sam said. “They have a great crowd and atmosphere, so it is a great three points from us. Automatic promotion is generally determined on how many one-nil wins you can get and it is the same when you are trying to get in the higher end of the Premier League.

“You want to be fluent, score and be open like we have been in the previous games of course – we have scored four goals in four different games remember – but today we were a solid, hard-working unit of lads determined to try and bounce back from the disappointment at Southampton.”

Another good result, especially as we were missing some good players due to injury for this game. This is a game we would definitely have lost under previous managers in my opinion.

On another note it’s nice to see Nolan getting on the score sheet, he scored plenty for Newcastle in their promotion winning season so let’s hope he can do the same for us.