We guarantee to do better in Birmingham

2:31pm Thursday 16th August 2007

COMING back to training has been hard this week, but the boys have just been getting on with it.

Obviously the defeat to Manchester City was very disappointing but it's only one game and we are looking forward to putting things right at Birmingham.

I don't know what went wrong. We seemed a bit nervous. I don't know why.

But if there is one thing I know for sure, it's that the boys will guarantee it won't happen again on Saturday.

We won't start the match that slow. We'll get more in their faces and play at a higher tempo.

We didn't know what to expect with City and they were very good.

Now we're looking forward to going to St Andrew's. It's been a good stomping ground for us in the past.

Obviously it won't be easy. They're new to the Premier League and they're buzzing with adrenaline.

We've got to match what they're going to throw at us and bring our quality through.

It's a pity we didn't have a game mid-week like a lot of the other teams. Personally, I'd have rather we got straight back into it so we don't dwell on the defeat. It would have been a good game to go into as well - Liverpool away. We would have been the underdogs in that match and it would have been a great game to be involved in.

But it wasn't to be. The positive for me is, it gave me a chance to go to Scunthorpe on Tuesday to watch Izzy Iriekpen in action.

He used to be at West Ham and whenever I get a chance I like to go watch my old friends with their new teams.

That's the thing about this club. West Ham is very family-orientated and so friendly and the way they treat the boys is really very good.

That's why the new players have settled so well in the dressing room.

If you come to West Ham and you can't settle in, then you are not going to settle in at any club.Everyone gets involved in the banter.

I haven't had a chance to see the new boys outside training yet, so I don't really know if any of them are terrible dressers or anything like that, but Freddie is a Calvin Klein model so I can't say anything about his fashion sense, can I? We missed Lucas Neill and Scott Parker on Saturday.

They're great leaders and I'm sure when they are both fit, they'll come into the team sharpen us up and get on to the boys a bit more.

They're doing more every day so hopefully they'll be back sooner rather than later. Bring on Saturday.