Nuno Espírito Santo said his West Ham players owe their fans “respect and dignity” after an underwhelming 3-1 defeat at Newcastle left the east London side on the brink or relegation to the Championship.
The Portuguese also admitted that the visiting supporters were “right” to direct chants of “you’re not fit to wear the shirt” at his team.
“It was a bad performance and a bad day for us,” said Nuno whose side’s goal difference is so vastly inferior to Tottenham’s that they will be all but down if Roberto De Zerbi’s side – currently two points ahead of West Ham in 17th place – draw at Chelsea on Tuesday.
“It’s going to be a very tough week ahead. But we’re going to try to give our fans a better performance against Leeds at the London Stadium on Sunday. We should do better. We can show the fans a different attitude.
Nuno admitted that chants of “you’re not fit to wear the shirt” from the away end stung. “It hurts a lot, of course,” he said. “This is our job, our life but the fans are right. Today they showed their anger and frustration. It hurts, it hurts the boys, it hurts us, it hurts the clubs. That’s why we should finish the season with dignity and respect for the fans.
“We started this game really bad, the way we conceded, the mistakes we made,” said Nuno who may rue beginning with a back three he was soon forced to swap for a back four. “Maybe it (the defensive trinity) was not the best decision. The plan for the game didn’t work out. Maybe we didn’t prepare the players well enough. We have to take responsibility.”
West Ham improved after Taty Castellanos, scorer of their consolation goal, stepped off the bench. Asked if he regretted not starting the forward, Nuno replied: “I regret so many things. But we have to make decisions and sometimes you consider it was maybe not the best one.
“But we’re still alive. Let’s wait for Tuesday. Even though it’s difficult there’s some hope. We cannot control what happens in other stadiums. What we did today was not enough for us in this fight. It was disappointing. We realise it’s extremely difficult now. Today was a missed opportunity.”
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Eddie Howe’s Newcastle rose to 11th. “We’ve seen an upturn but we’re hugely frustrated because the season could have been very different,” said Howe who was delighted with the performances of Will Osula and Nick Woltemade but once again left the apparently Bayern Munich bound Anthony Gordon on the bench.
“Will is a player of huge potential,” he said. He’s got great pace and power about him, he’s a really, really good finisher off both feet, which is very rare. He’s 6’3”, 6’4”, which is also a really big bonus for us because of set-plays and his hold-up play, so he’s got a presence up front, so I think he’s got great tools.
“He still needs a lot of development, he still needs to stay very humble and level because I think there’s a lot more to come from him, but he’s certainly done very well and I’m really pleased for him.
“And I thought Nick played very well today. He’s very creative, he’s a very, very skilful player.”