Sakho dreamed of scoring goal like that at Boleyn

Diafra Sakho insists that his brilliant goal against Liverpool was entirely intended.

The usual cynicism from the TV pundits surrounded the beautiful chip but our striker is having none of that.

He declared: “For my goal I saw the goalkeeper off his line and I only had one thing in mind. I tried it and it came off.

“It was definitely not a cross! I particularly dreamed of scoring a goal as good as that at the Boleyn Ground.

“That was my third goal – it’s great and that’s why I’m here and West Ham signed me for that. And even if I don’t score, so long as I’m useful for the team, that’s the important thing. I’m going to work every day in training to try to be as effective as possible.

“I have the players alongside me, like Kevin Nolan, who is very kind to me, who tries to communicate, even though we don’t speak the same language. He’s a good guy.

“I hope my partnership with Enner Valencia can continue to improve and we’re working every day in training for that. We’re not going to relax and we’ll carry on working hard at it because it’s only the beginning of the season and there will be plenty of matches to play together.

“We deserved the win. On the whole, we responded to the manager’s expectations and that of the staff. And if we continue to play like that, work together, united as a group, we’ll do good things in the Premier 

Scoring the first goal so early enabled us to play with a bit more freedom and so we were able to score the second too. Overall, I think we were very good..”