DAVID Moyes hailed Everton's resilience after they battled to a first Barclays Premier League win since the end of September with a 2-1 victory at West Ham, who slip back into the bottom three.
Louis Saha returned to the starting XI after he misse
d the midweek defeat to Benfica with a calf problem, and the striker netted from 20 yards against the run of play on 26 minutes.
Teenager Dan Gosling added a second just after the hour, but West Ham made a fight of it following an own goal by Tony Hibbert.
"We have not played that well, so we cannot ask for any more," said Moyes. "When it was 2-0, I felt we had shored it up with nearly a perfect away performance where you have got the goals, but did not play that well.
"The key is always to find a winning formula, and today we have found one. But we need to play better than we have done."
West Ham manager Gianfranco Zola once again could not fault his side's effort, but admitted he was at a loss to comprehend another defeat.
"It is a big question mark for me, how can we lose a game like that," he said. "We have to analyse the problems first and find solutions.
"I felt the players gave everything. Their attitude and their commitment was very good.
"But we have to find out straight away what is not working well, because it is not doing us any favours."
