Alan Curbishley was "looking to push on from here" after West Ham United came through a tricky test against Sunderland to claim a 3-1 victory.
With a tight Premier League encounter seemingly heading for a draw yesterday, substitutes Luis Boa Morte and Nolberto Solano proved to be the aces up the manager's sleeve, after he shuffled his pack with just over a quarter-of-an-hour remaining. Mark Noble and Matthew Etherington made way for the fresh legs of the two international-class players and they had an instant impact.
"I got a bit of stick from the crowd for that double substitution but we had to shake it up a little bit," Curbishley said after seeing his fresh-legged duo engineer the win at the Boleyn Ground. In the end, a Solano-inspired Craig Gordon own goal and a Craig Bellamy effort, set up by Boa Morte, finally sunk Sunderland.
Earlier, Kenwyne Jones had wiped out Carlton Cole's first-half opener but Curbishley was pleased his players were eventually able to turn things around. "Thankfully, we managed to break upfield and score a couple of goals but that's the way games go sometimes and I'll happily take three points.
"It was proving to be a difficult time for us because Sunderland were enjoying a lot of possession and they had got themselves on top but, fortunately, we managed to weather the storm and I'm delighted with the result.
"Nolberto Solano has been at the club for five weeks but he's also been away on international duty twice since then and he's only trained with us about five times. "He only arrived back in England from Chile yesterday morning and I just thought that he'd be better employed as a substitute," explained Curbishley after the debutant Peruvian met Boa Morte's centre to force an own goal from Gordon.
"What Nobby did for us today was the very reason why I brought him into the club. He's got a great first touch, he brings people into the game and he calms everything down." Boa Morte also had a hand in Bellamy's stoppage-time strike but it owed much to the fit-again Wales captain's desire to score.
"Bellamy and Cole haven't started a game together and while they were both running out of steam towards the end of the match. I stuck with Craig because I just felt that if a late chance came along, then he would take it," revealed Curbishley. "Before that, Roy Keane had done ever so well after changing his team around at the break and Sunderland were a different proposition in the second half.
"Although they had tried to make it difficult for us with their 4-5-1 formation, we'd still managed to break them down with Cole's goal and I felt that we deserved to be in front at the interval. In fact, I was looking forward to the second half but then Sunderland got off to the better start, they managed to pen us in and Kenwyne Jones brought them back into the game with his equaliser.
"After that, we found ourselves under a bit of pressure and Robert Green also had to make a great, match-winning save from Grant Leadbitter. That stop summed up exactly what Greeny's been doing for us all season and he certainly hasn't done himself any harm out there today.
"After the international break, one or two of my players found it a bit tough but we dug in and we got a result," concluded Curbishley ahead of his tenth-placed side's visit to Harry Redknapp's high-flying Portsmouth on Saturday. "Now I'm looking forward to picking up some more points and pushing on from here."