West Ham did not deserve to lose to Southampton this evening, according to Hammers boss Slaven Bilic.
The east Londoners started sloppily and fell behind before the game was 10 minutes old when Maya Yoshida poked home from close range.
The visitors rallied and grew into the encounter but were unable to find a breakthrough, despite playing the majority of the second half against 10 men after Victor Wanyama received a straight red card for a lunge on Dimitri Payet.
West Ham missed the chance to leapfrog Manchester United and climb to fifth place in the table courtesy of the 1-0 defeat, which left Bilic bitterly disappointed.
“Of course we are gutted because this was a great opportunity for us,” he told the club's official website.
“It’s a game we didn’t deserve to lose – we made a sloppy start but were the better team for three-quarters of the game.
Captain Mark Noble echoed his manager's sentiments and conceded that he and his teammates had struggled to make their numerical advantage count on the South Coast.
"At the end of the day its hard to break 10 men down," he told Sky Sports. "We found that out against Aston Villa.
"We started quite slowly. They got a couple of ricochets for the goal - you that little bit of luck - and we didn't have that today.
"Nothing seemed to drop for us today and it's disappointing. We tried everything.
"They defended really well when they needed to and we just couldn't get the goal."
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Although Bilic was evidently frustrated his side were unable to mount a comeback the Croatian is adamant West Ham need to look ahead to Tuesday's FA Cup fourth round replay against Liverpool rather than dwell on their latest defeat.
"We are gutted that we lost this way. Tuesday is the next game, we have to lift ourselves up, learn from our mistakes and beat Liverpool."
