Alphonse Areola felt West Ham United gave a performance full of character to bounce back from their heavy defeat at Crystal Palace with a hard-fought 2-2 draw against Liverpool on Saturday.
The Irons led, then trailed, in a see-saw Premier League contest at London Stadium that ultimately saw the points shared.
After Jarrod Bowen headed home his 20th goal of the season to break the deadlock two minutes before the break, Liverpool came roaring back to level through Andy Robertson moments after the restart.
Areola was then the unfortunate scorer of an own goal – after Cody Gakpo’s shot deflected off both Angelo Ogbonna and Tomáš Souček – as Liverpool took the lead, but there was still time for Michail Antonio to ensure the scores would end level.
West Ham’s France goalkeeper returned after missing six games with a groin problem, and made seven saves to help his side secure the point, and he was pleased with the fight shown by his team in east London.
“We managed to fight very well,” he said. “We conceded two goals we could have avoided, but the quality in front of us was high and we managed to tie and be competitive.
“It feels great to be back. Honestly I don’t feel my legs anymore, but I’ll recover well, get straight in the ice bath and be back and ready for the next game.
“We have three finals to go. We don’t have pressure – we live with it. The most important thing now is that we have that game in our legs and mind. We’ll recover well and push again.”
The Irons weathered a strong start from the Reds to turn the tide in their favour by half-time – and then show resilience after they fell 2-1 down – and Areola said that was much-needed after the collapse at Selhurst Park six days ago.
“We made him [Alisson] work today,” he continued. “He’s done his job, but it’s encouraging for us for the next games.
“After the Palace game we were really down because of the performance, but now we managed to recover well. We didn’t come back with three points but we’re still here and we’ll keep pushing.”
Areola made saves from the likes of Luis Díaz, Cody Gakpo and Ryan Gravenberch to help his team to their point, as well as suffering a painful boot to his toe towards the end of the contest from Gakpo.
And he explained the incident which followed, as he called for play to be stopped for treatment as Gakpo tried to steal in to score.
“He stood on my foot and I felt my toe straight away,” Areola said. “So I looked at the ref and from what I understood he said to put it on the floor.
“So I put it on the floor and put my hand down to pull my socks up and I heard the crowd shouting.
“Then the ref came to me and we managed to do what we had to do. We were ready for that game which was the important thing, and we showed we’re not done in the season and that we’re here to compete.”
