West Ham midfielder and captain Nigel Reo-Coker has said that his team is not getting carried away with their early success.

"The main thing now is that we keep our feet on the ground," he told the Icons website. "There is absolutely no point us getting carried away because there is such a long way to go yet in the season. Five games is nothing, really, and a lot can change between now and May. It would be dangerous to get over-excited at this stage. All we can do as players is concentrate on collecting as many points as we can, and the sooner we can acquire them the better."

The England U21 star sees avoiding relegation as the main target for this season. "We might be in the top six right now but avoiding relegation from the league is still our main priority. It's the one goal we set ourselves and only once that has been achieved will we set a new target. In the Premiership I think teams like West Ham have to play for their lives to get results, so we'll keep on thinking we're in relegation trouble until that's not the case! We just can't allow ourselves to get in the comfort zone."

In the meantime, Nigel is enjoying the success of the team so far. "The start to the season has gone better than any of us expected, but I don't think anyone that's seen West Ham play so far will say that we don't deserve to have ten points in the bag from our first five games. We're all delighted with the team's form, so up to now we're thoroughly enjoying our Premiership experience. Beating Fulham at Craven Cottage on Saturday was another great day for us to savour, but I wouldn't say that it was especially sweet because it was a London derby. Every win in the Premiership is extremely enjoyable because it's so hard to do."

Marlon Harewood's recent form has delighted the young midfielder. "A week or two ago I was telling everyone who would listen that Marlon Harewood is a quality striker and that he would score plenty of goals for West Ham this season - and now that he's bagged four in two games I'm delighted to have been proved right! Marlon deserves all the praise he is getting at the moment because he works so hard at his game on the training field. Not many people get to see the hard graft he puts in, day in, day out, to improve his game. He really is a superb, dedicated professional.

"I also admire Marlon for the way he's shaken off all the criticism he's had to contend with over the last few weeks, and also for long spells of last season too. It seems like he's the sort of player that's easy to bash for some unknown reason, but luckily his character is so strong that he won't let it affect him. He's always been an upbeat person, but I must say it's brilliant to see him buzzing the way he is at the moment. Goals breed confidence in strikers so Marlon must feel amazing at the moment."

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