Cardiff 0 West Ham 2: Mark Noble hails ‘massive’ Hammers win

Mark Noble hailed West Ham United’s “massive win” after 10-man Hammers ended a miserable run of results by beating relegation rivals Cardiff City.

After a lengthy delay due to Guy Demel’s first-half injury, West Ham boss Sam Allardyce finally had something to celebrate when Carlton Cole broke the deadlock shortly before the interval.

We have been embarrassed in the two Cup games recently and this is a tough place to come

Mark Noble

West Ham were coming off the back of a 5-0 loss to Nottingham Forest and a 6-0 thrashing by Manchester City in the past week, and the visitors threatened to lose their grip on the game when James Tomkins was dismissed.

However captain Noble sealed three points in the dying moments at the Cardiff City Stadium to lift the east London side out of the bottom three and demote the home side to 18th place.

“That was massive,” Noble told BBC Sport.

“We have been poor lately, we have been embarrassed in the two Cup games recently and this is a tough place to come, but we have lost a man and still managed to win.

“Every shot they had went straight to our goalie and they had a deflected shot just stay out so we have had a bit of luck that we have not had recently.

“We have a good bunch of lads who work for each other and now with players coming back and we are looking forward to the next few games.”