West Ham United’s David Moyes suggested that his players believe they can bring an end to Bayer Leverkusen’s unbeaten streak, which has seen Xabi Alonso’s side end Bayern Munich’s era of dominance in the Bundesliga.
The German outfit prevailed when they hosted the Hammers at the BayArena last week, and Moyes indicated that he feels his side can produce a strong performance in front of the home faithful at London Stadium on Thursday.
‘You have to say we went to Leverkusen and it got to the 83rd minute before they scored the first goal. It might take us that long before we can do it, but we have to have that patience and that level of trying to find a way of winning the game, or certainly getting a couple of goals in front at the end of 90 minutes,’ Moyes explained in his pre-match press conference.
‘We’ll try to do it, we’ll do everything we can, but we have to be mindful of how we do it and not be over-exposed. We did a job at Leverkusen for long periods, but obviously we couldn’t quite see it through.’
Embed from Getty ImagesMoyes added that he believes Leverkusen are ‘one of the best teams in Europe at this moment in time, and certainly a team who will be in the UEFA Champions League next year and look as if they’d be quite comfortable in that company.’
‘I think we should give them respect. We’ll do our best on Thursday night to not give them too much, but ultimately they deserve the respect because of the results.’
‘Normally, it’s towards the end of the season that the biggest games come,’ Moyes quipped in his press conference. ‘If you’re playing big games at the end of the season it means you’ve been relatively successful because you’ve got to play good teams [to keep progressing].’
‘When you’re getting words like quarter-finals, semi-finals, it’s exciting. Obviously the final is what you want to get to, and win it, but you have to go through the process to get there. It will be a difficult, difficult game, but one we’ve got belief that we can find a way to try and make it.’
