Seventh Heaven?

David James says that seventh place is a realistic target for the Hammers after he kept his second away clean sheet of the season at Fulham on Monday.

When asked if that was the aim, he replies: "Damn right it is. The confidence booster was winning away at Fulham which, bar Manchester United and Ipswich previously, we haven't done.

"So with six games left and nine points at home to get, if we pick up a few away from home, there is no reason why we can't finish seventh.

"It was important that we reproduced some sort of form away from home, and in the first 15 or 20 minutes I thought we looked half decent on Monday although we didn't have any shots.

"But we had to win to stop the awayday hoodoo, voodoo, or whatever it is called!"

David's other clean sheet away was at Old Trafford, no less, while Shaka Hislop produced a shut out in the goalless draw with Derby County in September.

And it is that away form which will unfortunately scupper the club's chances of making it to Europe next season. A seventh spot would only allow InterToto Cup qualification if Chelsea and Arsenal reach the FA Cup final, and West Ham have declined entry to it this season.

With sixth spot looking out of reach, the only other way to make Europe would be through the lottery of the Fair Play League, whereby UEFA give a couple of 'wild card' entries to countries drawn from a hat.

The clubs in those countries who finish highest of their Fair Play League, and who have not otherwise qualified for Europe, take up that position.

Secretary Peter Barnes explains: "Points are awarded based on yellow and red cards received, as well as other factors based on assessors' reports, such as the behaviour and support of the fans, respect of the players towards the match officials, and so on."

Although the fans' marks score high in a complex system of averages combined with those red and yellow cards, West Ham occupy a mid-table position which is unlikely to change dramatically in the remaining six games of the season.

Manchester United, incidentally, top the table at the moment.

Despite reports to the contrary, if Blackburn get relegated having already qualified for Europe by winning the Worthington Cup, they will not be stripped of their place in favour of a club with a superior league position, while similarly, relegation for Fulham would not affect their qualifying for Europe should they win the FA Cup.

Nonetheless, David insists there is plenty to play for - not least to defy the critics who felt Glenn Roeder was not the man for the job when he was appointed in the summer.

"He was a new manager, a young manager, and they have got to pick on someone, haven't they?

"But I signed for the club because of Glenn and the first thing we had to do was improve on last season. At the moment it looks as if we are going to do that.

"Glenn has stuck at it and we have had some bad results, let's be fair, but I can't think of a bad run with six or seven poor games, just a couple of bad results after which we picked things up. We have got a bit of resilience, which is nice.

"We have let ourselves down with the away form - that is an understatement - but the thing is we have maintained the very good home form which has kept us afloat in a lot of respects, and with that away result, it should give us some sort of confidence to play the last three away games rather than considering them as zero points and everybody's waste of time, so to speak.

"We have just played a side that have spent much more money than us this summer. They had big ambitions and there was big talk prior to the season starting whereas ours was a bit more conservative, so to speak, although the intention was obviously to do well."

Glenn regarded David's early save from Barry Hayles as 'like scoring a goal' but he admits: "I don't know who it was. You are not conscious of who it is, you just try and stop them and fortunately I did.

"Any save is important but I was happy and I enjoyed the game. We did what we had to do although it was scrappy - and we got a clean sheet away from home so it is a double bonus.

"We have played teams who are fighting for survival over Easter and Fulham had to win, but we weathered the storm. It was scrappy, not pretty at all, but we have won the game, which is more important than anything.

"Everyone as a team all had our fair share of things to do which is good, and without sounding silly I think we would have been happy with 0-0 considering our away form this year.

"But we have created a goal, though I don't think we created much more than that in the second half. We had possession, but the emphasis was on not losing, and the bonus was we got the win.

"The problem we had in the first half was allowing their right winger to get crosses in too easily, but fortunately they didn't punish us.

"But in the second half Seb did a good job on the left and as a team we all had to grind it out. I don't think the conditions suited a fancy game of football anyway, but as a team we dug deep and did what we had to do.

"To be fair the midfield won their tackles when they needed to and it wasn't as if we were getting hammered by shots even though they were getting their shots in - we dug in well.

"We weren't anticipating losing either of the last two games but if we had done we would have been in the melee in the bottom half, but we are well clear now and in the dizzy heights of single figures at last, and it's looking good."