Antonio hopes goals start flowing again

LONDON (CMC):

Ebullient Reggae Boy Michail Antonio says he was pleased to end an eight-game goal drought at club level, even though West Ham United were knocked out of the English FA Cup by his former loan club Southampton in mid-week, and hopes to start finding the net regularly again.

“I’ve been saying it over the last couple of weeks that I feel like a goal’s been coming,” said the 31-year-old Hammers striker, whose cup goal – his ninth in all competitions for the club this season – was his first since scoring in a 3-2 win over London neighbours Crystal Palace on New Year’s Day.

“I worked quite hard for the team against Wolves [a 1-0 victory on Sunday] and managed to get the assist, so I said it was coming – I could feel it,” he told the club’s website.

“I managed to get the goal, so hopefully this goal can get me on a nice little run to finish off the season.”

Attempting to put a positive spin on the 3-1 cup defeat, Antonio, who last year became West Ham’s leading all-time goalscorer, insisted the Hammers have serious ambitions of Champions League qualification.

Fifth-placed West Ham sit two points below Manchester United in the race for the Premier League top four ahead of today’s trip to second-placed Liverpool.

David Moyes’ men are also chasing Europa League glory, with a two-legged last-16 clash against Spanish club Sevilla to come in the next two weeks.

THREE GOALS

“Onwards and upwards, basically; we’ve got to pick ourselves up from this and go again on Saturday,” said father-of-four Antonio, who has scored three goals in six appearances for Jamaica since making his debut last year.

“Obviously we wanted to go further in this [FA Cup] competition, and now we’re out, so all we’ve got to do is concentrate on what we are in now, and that’s the Europa League and the Premier League.

“We’re still going for the top four. So, with all the negatives that have happened [at Southampton], we’ve got to think about the positives for the season.

“We’ve got the top-four chase still and we’re in the last 16 of the Europa League. Let’s just see what we can do with those and keep moving forwards.

“One thing about us is that nothing knocks us down. We don’t stay down. We get up and we go again.”