West Ham United boss David Moyes is "glad" that his West Ham United side are recognised as a Champions League contender heading into the second half of the campaign.

The Hammers narrowly missed out on a top-four place last season, but they managed to qualify for the Europa League – a remarkable achievement considering they were fighting for Premier League survival 12 months earlier.

West Ham are again in the running to qualify for Europe's elite club competition, and speaking to the press ahead of Tuesday's league clash with Watford, Moyes expressed his delight for the club's recognition as European challengers.

"I'm glad that people are talking about West Ham challenging for the top four because that shows where we have come to. Even last year we probably were not talked about in those terms more could we make a run for Europe," Moyes said on Monday.

"It shows our improvement and we've been making some strides, we need to keep playing really well and we need to now look at the last 15 games.

"I think we've got 15 league games to go and we have to play really well. We're hoping that we can take three points against Watford tomorrow evening where we hope to take three points and keep us going and keep hanging onto the shirttails of the teams above us and see what we can do.

"The team have played really well for long periods of the season, we have had little ups and down but no more than anybody else so I'm looking forward to challenging again in the second half of the season."

West Ham currently sit fifth in the Premier League table, one point behind Manchester United in fourth, who also play on Tuesday night against Burnley.