West Ham United manager Sam Allardyce has said that he is still having fingers crossed when it comes to taking West Ham to the play-off final. West Ham managed a very comfortable 2-0 win over Cardiff in the first leg of the semi-final encounter between the two clubs. The second leg will be at home, which is a cause of worry for West Ham given their poor home form this season, and Allardyce has said that he is not making any judgements based on the first leg encounter. Allardyce was brought into West Ham United to take them to the Premier league on the first instance itself, but he has failed to do so via the automatic promotion route.

West Ham will now play the second leg encounter against Cardiff in the semi-final hoping to play either against Blackpool or Birmingham in the final. From the first leg results, it appears that West Ham will be playing Blackpool in the final of the play-offs. However, West Ham manager Sam Allardyce reckons that it is still a long way to go before they achieve the dream of promotion. Sam Allardyce has already had one successful promotion experience with Bolton, although he has failed one time as well.

“We’re not going to get carried away. It was a terrific result but there’s a long way to go. We need to be as professional on Monday as we were in Cardiff and that should be enough to take us through. Two goals is a margin that’s difficult for them but they’ll be thinking about getting the first goal and whether we’ll be nervous and edgy and trying to protect what we’ve got. It’s my job to start mentally preparing them for the fact that they’ve got to approach the game as a 0-0,” Allardyce said.