The West Ham boss is not expecting an easy match against his former club Tottenham on Saturday.
West Ham boss Nuno Espirito Santo has dismissed Tottenham’s dismal record at home and insists it is “still a difficult place to be”.
The Hammers travel to Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday in a crucial match for both teams for different reasons.
West Ham will make the short trip from east to north London, third from bottom in the Premier League, seven points from safety. They need wins quickly if they are to overcome Nottingham Forest and Leeds, who have both shown an improvement in form in recent weeks. Nuno’s men have taken the opposite path having not won a league match since the beginning of November.
“There’s a lot of football to play but we have to realize that every game is very important to us. It’s very, very important to us,” said Nuno, who faces his former club this weekend after spending four largely miserable months at Spurs in 2021.
“It was an honor and a pleasure to manage Spurs,” he added. “Things didn’t go well. It’s the third game in a row where we’ve played clubs I’ve managed before. [after Wolves and Nottingham Forest]. Nothing changes, it’s a new game, it’s a tough opponent and a difficult place. We are so necessary to achieve a good result and our concentration is there to go and compete.
Spurs are a good team, says West Ham boss
Tottenham, who will be giving new signing Conor Gallagher a debut, have one of the worst home records in the top flight this season having won just twice in front of their own fans with the pressure firmly on boss Thomas Frank. However, Nuno is expecting a difficult afternoon.
“It’s a good team with talented players,” he said. “It’s always a difficult place to get to and they are rivals. It’s a London derby. What the fans expect is for us to fight well and then we’ll see.”
West Ham hope to have Konstantinos Mavropanos, Mateus Fernandes and Lucas Paqueta in the squad for the weekend.
“They all recover with different things,” Nuno said. “Konstantinos had a neck problem that took some time and is still painful. Matheus is back doing individual sessions and Lucas is still under treatment, so let’s see. We still have a few days left.”
Paqueta’s future remains uncertain after expressing a desire to return to boyhood club Flamengo and Nuno admitted the Brazilian midfielder’s situation needs to be addressed.
“I think it’s a situation we need to resolve,” he said. “We always want our best players involved and Lucas is one of our best players, so let’s try to resolve the situation.”
West Ham’s January spending may not be over
West Ham have already spent around £47m on strikers Taty Castellanos and Pablo Felipe in the current window. Asked if there were any other positions he wanted to strengthen, Nuno replied: “There are, but let me try to keep that to myself. We are working very hard as a club to find the right ones in a very tricky transfer window to manage. We have to make good decisions and we cannot afford mistakes.
“We are working on the ins and outs. I think we need to rebalance our team and bring more options to certain positions and also find the best solutions for players who don’t have minutes to continue their careers.”
Former England internationals James Ward-Prowse and Callum Wilson have both been linked with a move away from the London Stadium in recent weeks.
Wilson is a reported target for Everton while Southampton have been mentioned as a potential destination for former Saint Ward-Prowse.
