Manuel Pellegrini believes his West Ham players are showing trust in the way he wants to play following his side’s 4-2 win over Burnley at the London Stadium.
West Ham took control of the game early and got their goal in the tenth minute when Marko Arnautovic caught Burnley defender James Tarkowski at the edge of the box. He raced clear and slotted in the ball underneath an oncoming Joe Hart.
The Hammers continued to control the flow of the game and another chance came just ten minutes later, but this time Hart made a good save from another Arnautovic effort after Felipe Anderson slid in the Austrian inside the box.
The West Ham goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski was also alert to keep a Ben Mee header out at the half-hour mark. However, a few minutes later the home side came close to doubling the lead from a curling effort from Anderson. Hart was beaten but Burnley defender Mee cleared it on the goal-line.
The home side continued to dominate but paid for their missed opportunities. The Clarets equalised on the stroke of half-time. Johann Berg Gudmundsson took advantage of some indecisive defending and latched on to Ashley Westwood’s through ball and slotted it past Fabianski in the West Ham goal.
Pellegrini’s side came out in the second half firing and Arnautovic was at it again after the break when he unleashed a shot from the edge of the box. But Hart made a brilliant save to keep things level at the London Stadium.
West Ham continued to push and raced back into the lead again when Anderson found the far bottom corner of Hart’s goal following some brilliant work from Grady Diangana to create the opportunity for the Brazilian in the 68th minute.
However, Burnley fired back just a few minutes later to equalise when former Leeds United striker Chris Wood’s head met Gudmundsson’s high corner and the ball thudded into Fabianski’s bottom corner.
The game continued to remain an open contest and Anderson again came close to giving West Ham the lead again, but his curling effort hit the woodwork in the 80th minute.
But just a few minutes later the Brazilian got West Ham back into the lead again when he latched onto a rebound from an Arnautovic shot and converted an easy chance.
The game didn’t die out even after Anderson scored and Wood again came close to equalising for Burnley but his header thudded into the woodwork and not the back of the net in the 86th minute.
But Javier Hernandez confirmed the points for West Ham when he dinked in their fourth goal in stoppage time following a lightning breakaway and sealed the win for the home side.
Pellegrini lauded the result and while he was not happy that they conceded a silly goal on the stroke of half-time, the West Ham boss believes his players are now showing more trust in his style.
The Hammers manager remains keen to improve his side’s defence but he was also pleased with the attacking mentality his players showed to get the win.
He said in a press conference after the game: “It was a great performance and a great result.
“Today, it was a difficult game but I spoke with the players we cannot think about conceding that late goal in the first half.
"The players have a lot of trust in the way we are playing.
“It’s not like we allowed them to score.
"They are very strong, they only had one chance in the first half and they scored.
“It was more important I saw the mentality of the team to score one more goal than they did.”
West Ham will next travel to Yorkshire a week from today when they will take on Huddersfield Town.
