Marco Silva was frustrated by Fulham’s lack of creativity after watching the Whites fall to a fifth straight defeat against struggling West Ham United this afternoon.

The home side were beaten by Harrison Reed’s own goal midway through the first half and Silva, watching on from the stands as he served the first of a two-match touchline ban having been sent off at Old Trafford last month, felt his side didn’t do enough to break down the visitors.

“Yes, it was a frustrating afternoon for us to have almost 80% of possession. But just to have is not really what we want and is not important for us if you don’t use that possession to create. Our first-half I think was so static from ourselves, not dynamic on the ball. We arrived with the ball in certain areas that we like, but after we didn’t play with the dynamic to have shots on target, to create chances, and it was not really good enough.”

Silva was disappointed that West Ham’s winner stood after Vladimir Coufal handled the ball past Antonee Robinson in the build up.

“Of course, they scored with an own goal that should be disallowed because it’s a clear handball from Coufal in that moment, and it’s difficult to understand, again, why the goal was not disallowed, and why VAR didn’t check that moment.”

Fulham started the second half with a double change but were ultimately left disappointed following the final whistle.

“We tried to change to give more creativity with Tom Cairney in the middle area and of course with Manor [Solomon] to try to get in some more one v one situations, to be more unpredictable for them. Better second-half but not at the level we needed to play to create more chances. We had two or three dangerous moments, a big chance for Andreas to equalise the game, it’s true, a good header from Tosin, but it was not enough for us to equalise.”

The Fulham head coach insisted that hard graft will be the only way the Whites can end their losing run – with a trip to Everton coming up next week.

“Working hard is the only way that we can. We’ve had so many good performances this season so far in this way. Of course it’s a moment for everyone to pop up and show the personality that you need at this level to take good decisions on the pitch in every single moment, even if you are not so confident like before.”