West Ham boss Gianfranco Zola admitted he had breathed a sigh of relief after Valon Behrami’s goal ended a run of seven matches without a win.
Swiss international Behrami struck in the first half at Sunderland and the Hammers held for a 1-0 victory that moved them away from the relegation zone.
But the visitors had to defend for long periods on a day when Sunderland were once again punished for failing to take their chances.
“We are passionate about this game — we take it too seriously sometimes, so it is normal that you suffer a little bit,” Zola said.
“This is going to give the boys a big boost. Finally, we have got a very important result after our hard work,” he said. “It has been a difficult time and it is very, very important for the players — and for the manager as well.”
“Maybe sometimes we have played better football and not got anything. The result is something we think we deserved for what we have done in the past,” Zola said. “I am very pleased for the players. They were fantastic. It is all down to them.”
Behrami’s winner came somewhat against the run of play as Sunderland dominated the first half, but failed to make the most of their chances.
Sunderland created opportunities in the opening 45 minutes, but failed to take any of them with Djibril Cisse passing up a series of chances, and as their desperation grew after the break, they ran out of ideas.
It could have been different for the hosts if James Collins had been punished for fouls on Cisse and Kenwyne Jones. The first was just outside the penalty area but could have been punished with a red card, while the second half was inside the box.
“We feel they were penalties, but there is no point in me going on too much about it. It always comes across, particularly when you lose, as sour grapes,” Sunderland boss Roy Keane said.
“Sometimes they go for you, sometimes against. It wasn’t to be,” he said.
Keane admitted after the game that his side, which has not won back-to-back league games all season, needs a change of mentality.
“Last year, we ended up losing 20-odd games — if you turn 20-odd defeats into six or seven draws, it makes a hell of a difference at the end of the season,” he said.
“That’s something we have got to find at the club in the first team, that mentality where we are not at it, but we will take a draw,” Keane said. “We have seen other teams doing it. It just seems to be win or bust.”
“That’s something we are daily working to change. You have got to take advantage of games like this,” he said. “There are no gimmes in this league, but a home game, we felt, was an opportunity at least to get a point.”
English Premier League
Team P GD PTS
1 Chelsea 14 28 33
2 Liverpool 14 13 33
3 Man Utd 13 15 25
4 Aston Villa 14 6 24
5 Arsenal 14 7 23
6 Hull 14 -2 22
7 Everton 13 -2 19
8 Portsmouth 14 -5 19
9 Fulham 13 1 18
10 Middlesbrough 14 -6 18
11 Man City 14 7 17
12 Bolton 14 -2 17
13 West Ham 14 -5 17
14 Stoke 14 -10 17
15 Tottenham 14 -3 15
16 Sunderland 14 -8 15
17 Newcastle 14 -5 14
18 Wigan 13 -3 13
19 Blackburn 14 -11 13
20 West Brom 14 -15 11
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier