Bilic fears Malta meltdown

Slaven Bilic has admitted that the heat will pose a problem for his West Ham players today as they try to avoid a meltdown in Malta. The croat compared the humid conditions to a sauna. The Hammers face Birkirkara with a 1-0 lead from the first leg of their europa league secondround qualifying tie.

Temperatures in the Maltese town are set to hit 30c (86F) but manager Bilic expects his side to overcome the conditions by dominating possession.

‘The heat is a problem, you cannot get used to this, no matter how much you read in the papers, until the moment you land here,’ he said yesterday.

‘When i go to croatia with my family and kids it’s the same. They tell me, “Dad, it’s going to be 37-38 degrees” but when we landed here it felt like a sauna. The heat will be a problem for us, but we are experienced enough and we are good enough.

‘With the greatest respect to Birkirkara, for at least 70 per cent of the match we are going to be the ones dictating the tempo.

‘We should be capable of keeping the ball and must not go crazy in terms of running because the heat is their advantage as they live in those weather conditions.’

it took a 90th-minute strike from James Tomkins to split the two teams in the first leg at Upton Park.

‘We’re better than them but to produce a better result than 1-0 we should have scored earlier, which i think we deserved,’ said Bilic.

‘i am sure that it should be enough, especially if we score a goal here, which we will try to do — and our team is capable of doing that.’

West Ham have taken a strong squad for the trip to the Ta’Qali national Stadium and are expected to field a side full of first-team regulars as they try to go through to the next round, where they would face inverness caledonian Thistle or Fc astra of Romania.

WEST HAM (probable 4-4-2): Adrian; O’Brien, Tomkins, Reid, Cresswell; Amalfitano, Kouyate, Noble, Jarvis; Zarate, Maiga.