After an initial good spell on the road since Peter arrived, West Ham suffered a sequence of away losses which began with Sunderland.
His reasoning?
"It was not playing well, nothing else; you need at least eight players playing well on the day - and that would stretch you," he says candidly.
"But we have had nowhere near that amount of players playing well and we have not played well as a team.
"There was commitment at Crystal Palace but the final composure wasn't there; apart from that we were found drastically wanting at Sunderland, Millwall, and Reading - we were very poor and we got our just rewards."
Peter is glad that Matthew Etherington is fit again and adds:
"Since I came Mattie has been top drawer - and you want everyone to be fit every time.
"We need the big players to perform and the bigger the stage is you should have your best players come to the fore.
"Unfortunately on the bigger occasions recently we have not had that which is something people have questioned.
"There is no answer to that because people are telling the truth and the only way to reply now is to perform well and win."
As for the tension, he says:
"Nervousness doesn't matter; I was as nervous in my first game as a pro as I was in my last - it is an excitement and something you grasp.
"You don't want to temper it too much because sometimes it can make you perform as well as you can.
"Over-nervousness arrives if you think you haven't prepared as well as you can, I feel."
Peter is looking for nothing less than three wins out of three and adds:
"People are saying 'you could win two and draw one and still go to the playoffs' - but at this club you are expected to win every game.
"That is how it has been since I walked in through the door - and it is how it will be when I walk out the door.
"As far as I am concerned Saturday is the last game of the season and we have got to win it, then we will go into the next one the same way."
Looking at Stoke, he says:
"They are very difficult to play against; Tony Pulis makes no bones about it not being pretty but his players will know exactly what is demanded of them.
"It will be twice as difficult because Stoke are in a position where they can't do anything but upset the apple cart - they will treat it like a cup final because that is the way he approaches every game.
"Tony loves getting one over on the big clubs and he has done it time and time again."