Football: Soccer-Moyes praises West Ham after long-awaited win over Brighton

BRIGHTON (Reuters) – West Ham United manager David Moyes was delighted to see his side finally get a Premier League win over Brighton & Hove Albion after a gritty defensive display and some clinical counter-attacking gave them a 3-1 win on Saturday.

The Hammers had failed to get the better of Brighton in 12 previous Premier League meetings, and for Moyes it was important to break that run of results.

“I’m thrilled with the three points because we have not won for years here. It’s been the same, coming here and not getting the results. Today was a well-deserved three points,” he told the BBC.

In doing so, his side climbed to the top of the table, a position Brighton occupied after the first two rounds of games, but it was not as easy as the scoreboard might suggest.

“Brighton have got an extremely good manager and his side are causing problems to plenty of teams, not just us. We worked hard on not getting picked off easily and we defended really well,” Moyes said.

Brighton racked up plenty of efforts on goal, but a combination of some superb saves from keeper Alphonse Areola and an energetic defensive effort by all of West Ham’s outfield players laid the foundations for their win.

“Let’s not kid ourselves, it (defending) is a part of football and it is not all about attacking. The last couple of games, we have defended really well as a team,” Moyes said.

Brighton manager Roberto De Zerbi was not too disappointed, despite his side’s first league loss of the season.

“It can happen in football, I am really frustrated for the result, but not for the performance,” he told the BBC.

“The performance was very good. We made some crucial and important mistakes in the first and third goals … when you concede the first goal, the space becomes smaller and it is more difficult,” he added.

(Reporting by Philip O’Connor, editing by Pritha Sarkar)