David Moyes defends team selection but admits West Ham defeat against Olympiacos 'wasn't a good performance'

David Moyes defended his team selection after West Ham's 17-match unbeaten run in Europe was ended by a 2-1 defeat to Olympiacos in the UEFA Europa League.

A moment of magic from Konstantinos Fortounis put the hosts ahead in the 33rd minute before Rodinei fired in a hopeful ball and Angelo Ogbonna got his clearance all wrong, slicing the ball into the back of the net to deepen the Hammers' woes before half-time.

Lucas Paqueta grabbed a late consolation but Olympiacos ran out deserved winners.

Moyes made seven changes to his starting line-up with a view to keeping players fresh for Sunday's Premier fixture against Everton and insisted the team was good enough to win in Pireaus.

"Look, we changed a lot of players tonight, we’ve got the Premier League coming up and we’ve got a League Cup game next week and we’d won the first two games in the group, which gave us leeway to make changes tonight," the Scot told the official club website.

"But maybe I have to recognise that while we didn’t win through the Conference League games easily, as they were all tough games, coming to Olympiacos after winning away in Freiburg, which was a good result, this wasn’t a good result and wasn’t a good performance.

"In our heads we certainly had a bigger picture in our heads and that was going into Sunday. I don’t think anybody could say the team we started with wasn’t a good team and wasn’t a team capable of winning or performing.

"Many of them have been very good players for us over the years and still are."

TNT Sports pundit Joe Cole was critical of West Ham's performance, particularly after the first half.

The former Hammer questioned the positioning and commitment of certain players in the build-up to the two goals and said the Irons "didn't do the basics" right.

“West Ham have dropped way below the standards that they’ve set. It’s not tight enough,” Cole told TNT Sports at half-time.

“Ogbonna, I think he’s suffering from not playing regularly. He made a mistake in the first half. Fornals not tight enough.

“But when you’re a winger, and you’re going all the way back with your full-back you’re there to stop the cross, and not be a mannequin. And these little details all add up.

“This group of players over the last few seasons have been on it on Thursday nights.

“And they didn’t do the basics tonight and they’ve been punished. I think David Moyes will be furious with them.

“We give them a bit of leeway because of what they’ve done before but when you drop below, you can only drop below for a little bit."

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