Slaven Bilic says West Ham starting to feel at home at London Stadium

By Peter Gilbert

Image: West Ham United have managed back-to-back wins at the London stadium

Slaven Bilic says West Ham are finally starting to feel at home at the London Stadium.

Bilic's side defeated Chelsea 2-1 in the EFL Cup in their last match at stadium, which was marred by crowd trouble, and beat Sunderland in their most recent home Premier League fixture.

West Ham are back at home against Stoke on Saturday, and Bilic hopes the stadium will be rocking once again.

Football Score Centre app

Sky Sports customers can watch Premier League goals and highlights every weekend at no extra cost

"It was a great atmosphere (against Chelsea)," said Bilic. "Don't get me wrong, what happened at the end was unacceptable and awful, but during the game it was a derby, a cup game, under the lights.

"We felt really great and also because of that atmosphere we played well, and it felt good because we had the fans behind us so we couldn't ask for a better atmosphere."

Advertisement

Watch NOW TV

Watch Sky Sports for just £6.99. No contract.

The club have been working hard to increase segregation between fans ahead of the match against Stoke to ensure there is no repeat of violence in the stands.

"It may help but that's the only thing that we can do," added Bilic.

Also See:

Image: West Ham's match with Chelsea has marred by a clash between fans

"The club have done everything, you can't say there wasn't segregation for the game against Chelsea, there was enough segregation, the gap between our fans and Chelsea fans was obvious.

"Now the club's going to make an even bigger gap, and to be fair that's all that we can do."

Image: West Ham striker Simone Zaza is yet to score for West Ham

Bilic's main concern on the pitch is a lack of goals from his strikers with no West Ham striker getting on the scoresheet this season, but the former Croatia boss is convinced his forward players will break that run soon. 

"We are not scoring many goals and we are creating chances," he added. "But I would rather have us creating chances and waiting for a moment that we're going to convert them, than not to create them all.

Bilic: 'Brave' Carroll is fine

West Ham boss Slaven Bilic says Andy Carroll is "good" despite being held up at gunpoint

"We were disappointed with the defeat at Everton last week but we are playing good recently really and we on a good path. We're going to score goals."

Bilic hopes to have forward Diafra Sakho and Andy Carroll back to fitness after the international break, but defender Winston Reid will miss the Stoke game through suspension.

Outbrain