Olympiacos manager Diego Martínez has challenged his team to take their game a level further than they showed in their 2-1 UEFA Europa League Group A victory over the Hammers when the two teams go head-to-head again at London Stadium on Thursday.
Martínez’s side withstood a late flurry from the Hammers, who netted through Lucas Paquetá in the closing stages, to claim their success, and the Piraeus outfit’s boss knows they need to up their game furtther if they are to claim a repeat in east London.
“Olympiacos is a team that always wants to win wherever it is,” Martínez said in his pre-match press conference. “We have come with great appetite and have earned the right to be in this competition.
“It will be an important night for us because we will be playing against a good Premier League team. If we want to get a good result we will have to play a more than perfect game.
“If we played a perfect game at home, now we have to do something more if we want to have hopes of winning.”
The Super League Greece side will also be looking to bounce back from their first domestic defeat of the season, after they went down to a 4-2 loss at home to PAOK at the weekend.
Martínez says that has led to some introspection, but he is sure his team will respond strongly when faced by the Hammers.
“After the bad result and game of the championship there has been enough self-criticism, it is part of our daily life,” he admitted.
“We’ve done good things in many games, but in this one we didn’t do anything well. Therefore, there is self-criticism every day and it is the only way we can follow to improve.
“For this and in the next game we want to perform better, we have worked for this match to do our best. In football there are surprises, in all competitions and competitions we see surprises.
“We know that we are facing a great opponent, a Premier League team and holder of the UEFA Conference League.
“When they came to Karaiskakis, they were a team with 17 consecutive games without defeat in Europe. We want to improve, we want to win and really for us all the games and the points we claim are important.”
