Lucas Urges Quick Start for West Ham

Lucas Neill, who seems to have long ago stolen the mantle of club captain from Nigel Roe-Coker, has called on the West Ham players to be on the pace from the beginning next season,

"It's a long season. I don't think we're going to be the champions but I think after the lessons we learned last year it's important we get off to a good start.

We have a chairman who has a dream, is a very ambitious guy and has very powerful resources so, like a lot of clubs he'll be looking to spend some money in the transfer market and hopefully him and the manager can bring in good quality and we can look up rather than down."