Graham Potter insisted his mood has improved after his frustrations bubbled over after West Ham’s dramatic late defeat to Brighton, though admits he’s feeling the pressure from supporters to turn results around.
The usually composed Hammers boss let rip in his post-match press conference shortly after watching his side throw away a lead in the final few minutes and declared: ‘If you want me to swear, I can swear.’
Potter cut a far jollier figure as he strolled into a sunny Rush Green with a smile to speak ahead of his side’s meeting with Tottenham on Saturday and remarked ‘it’s Costa del Romford!’
‘I’m better now,’ said Potter. ‘I think it would be surprising if I wasn’t upset after how the game unfolded, so that’s normal. Then it’s about accepting the human being we are and going, come on, we have to move forward.
‘Whenever you come into a club at the time we did, you look at the situation at the time, you know there’s going to be challenges.
‘You can see how competitive the league is so when you combine it all I never thought it was going to be easy.
Graham Potter was furious after West Ham suffered a late defeat at his former club Brighton
Carlos Baleba (centre) celebrates scoring Brighton’s late winner at the Amex Stadium
‘It certainly isn’t easy but I’ve said before, and I’ll say it again, it’s a fantastic challenge.
‘Wherever I am, the feeling is the same because you want to do well for yourself, you want to do well for your family, you want to do well for the club you are working for.
‘So, I feel the pressure of 62,000 West Ham fans. It’s a massive club with a real desire to do better than we are. So, you feel that.’
Potter faced chants from the travelling Hammers fans at the Amex Stadium in support of German striker Niclas Fullkrug, who had slammed the club’s ‘mentality problem’ and branded the side ‘s***’ in their previous draw against Southampton, another game where they dropped point to a late goal.
West Ham’s defeat to Brighton was their seventh Premier League game without a win and have dropped eight points in their last six matches from goals scored beyond the 88th minute.
‘I’m damned if I do, I’m damned if I don’t,’ added Potter. ‘You get criticised for being too nice. You get criticised for being too emotional.
‘At the end of the day, we’re not winning. So, you have to accept that. I think my reaction was a human reaction from a football manager.
‘I’d be surprised if there’s too many other football managers that would give you any other emotional reaction than the one I got.’
West Ham winger Crysencio Summerville is out for the season with a hamstring injury
Tomas Soucek thought he’d won it for West Ham at Brighton only for a late capitulation
To add to Potter’s woes, he confirmed that winger Crysencio Summerville will miss the rest of the season after undergoing surgery on a hamstring injury.
‘It’s been a complicated one with him,’ said Potter. ‘I think we’re looking towards pre-season.’
