Anton Ferdinand will do everything he can to put things right at Tottenham Hotspur and has told WHUTV of his personal pain following defeats by Chelsea and Liverpool.
The entire back five had been in fine form before the successive 4-0 reverses and a sombre but determined Ferdinand, the longest serving player at the club, has taken the manner of the results to heart. "These games hurt you know," he said. "I can only talk for myself but the last two games have hurt me and we have got to get it back. There is no better game to go into for me personally, with the rivalry that we have got, than Spurs on Sunday.
"Every game is tough in the Premiership but there is no better game to go into after these two bad defeats," he added. "Knowing the rivalry and everything this is where we are going to see who is going to step up to the plate." Ferdinand is clear though that the team can still bounce back in the final ten games of the season and make inroads up the table. "I can't say we are in a crisis. Everyone knows what a crisis is - which was last year - and we dug ourselves out of that. We have got to get back the feeling we had last year which helped us get out of that situation."
To do that, the 23-year-old centre-back knows the squad as a whole have to take responsibility and not look for excuses regardless of the unquestioned quality of the opposition. "It is disappointing to concede eight goals in two games. To have a good [goals against] record and then lose it in the space of two games is not a good thing. We have got to get back to the drawing board, back to the training pitch and back to the basics.
The homegrown centre-back, who struck a memorable last-gasp equaliser at White Hart Lane on 20 November 2005, continued. "I feel West Ham are a team that can play against these type of sides. We have showed that in the past. For me personally there is no excuses. We weren't good enough in these last two games. We have got to get back to what we do best and that is working hard for each other."