Aston Villa continued their fine form under manager Unai Emery, holding off West Ham to move back to the brink of the Premier League‘s top four.
Douglas Luiz fires in low from 20 yards before adding second-half penalty in the 51st minute. Jarrod Bowen’s deflected strike in the 56th minute gave Hammers hope before a fierce Watkins strike and Bailey goal put out all hopes of West Ham coming back into the game.
Coaches’ Reactions
Emery acknowledged the prowess of his opponents but he was also very happy with the reaction of his team.
“We are facing very good players, very good teams. When they scored, we reacted very well.
“That’s my demands with the players. Try to be consistent with our game plan and, with our scoring, we have to keep going. When we concede goals, we have to react quickly to recover our positioning and our game plan,” said Emery after the game.
Emery also went on to give special mention to Ollie Watkins calling him brilliant.
“He’s very competitive. He can add goals for the team and he did. It was fantastic.” Unai Emery.
Since Emery took charge, Watkins has been directly involved in 27 goals across 33 Premier League appearances, scoring 18 goals and providing 9 assists. His impressive performance places him behind only Mohamed Salah (35) and Erling Haaland (33) in terms of goal contributions during this period. Watkins has already scored five goals in the league this season.
David Moyes, West Ham’s manager, acknowledged the challenge, stating, “I see the players every day and know the levels. We need to play really well to keep up with the top six teams. The players are good, but as you can see, if this is the level we need to reach, then we need to improve greatly.”
