Bruno Lage makes Champions League point after Wolves lose to West Ham

Bruno Lage admits Wolverhampton Wanderers’ double dose of capital punishment shows the gap they have to bridge to become a Champions League contender.

Wolves’ chances of finishing inside the top four are hanging by a thread after back-to-back defeats to Arsenal and West Ham this week.

Fifth-placed West Ham moved five points ahead of Wolves, eighth, in the Premier League table after Tomas Soucek struck the decisive blow at the London Stadium.

And Wolves head coach Lage believes the last two games have shown the difference between his side and the ‘real teams’ fighting for the Champions League.

“The most important thing is we have 12 games to go and the people are talking about what is our goal - it should be very clear, our goal is to continue to play the way we play,” Lage said after watching his team lose to West Ham.

“We go into our next game against Crystal Palace and we need to play like we did against West Ham.

“We arrived in February with 40 points and our fans are talking about Champions League, and the real teams who have that goal because they invest a lot is teams like West Ham and Arsenal.

“We are not far away from them, because we played very well against them. Against Arsenal, we conceded a goal at the end, and today we conceded that chance and didn’t score any goals.

“We haven’t won anything, but I think we can understand better that we’re not far away from these teams. It’s in short details, in experience, and we need to win in the next 12 games to do our job. It’s been a good season until now, and we need to fight for every point until the end of the season.

“Under my command, no one is going to relax until the end of the season. I want 43 points against Crystal Palace.”

Lage came out in defence of his