Slaven Bilic delighted in West Ham’s return to winning ways at Crystal Palace even as he bemoaned the red card handed to Aaron Cresswell.
Manuel Lanzini scored the game’s only goal, converting a Cresswell cross, to secure a first victory for West Ham since August, easing the pressure on Bilic and dragging the Hammers out of the bottom three.
The contentious dismissal of Cresswell with a quarter of an hour remaining after two bookings in quick succession invited additional pressure on West Ham but a splendid late save by Adrian off Connor Wickham’s close range header secured the points for the visitors.
Cresswell had received his first yellow for what Martin Atkinson judged to be a dive in the area but what replays suggested was a foul by Yohan Cabaye. Forty-eight seconds later the left-back had another for a challenge on Wilfried Zaha and his manager was not impressed.
“First I would like to praise the team,” Bilic told BT Sport. “We showed everything, character, spirit, we deserved to win. The goal we scored was an amazing move from many players.
"For me it was a penalty on Cresswell and then the second yellow card is very harsh – never a second yellow card, never.
“Now that Aaron was back we made a little gamble because we didn’t expect him to be totally match fit, but he had a great game.”
The return of Cresswell, playing his first match of the season after suffering a knee injury in pre-season, saw Bilic adjust his formation accordingly.
Michail Antonio and Cresswell were deployed as wing-backs in a 3-5-2 and often found themselves as advanced as striker Simone Zaza. It is not the first time Bilic has used that particular formation and, having kept a first clean sheet five league matches, it is one that he will consider continuing with.
“It was straight after the Middlesbrough game that we started to prepare for Palace and also the best system for us that suits all our best players,” Bilic added. “We came to this system that I really like.
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“We need more than one game, more than one win. It is not about the system but much more about the approach and composure we have, how we cover each other and how we close them down.
“We showed how good a team we are and how good a unit we are.”
