West Ham 0 Blackburn 0

On a bitterly cold afternoon the crowd were scarcely warmed by a tepid game, with neither side seemingly capable or willing to raise the tempo for much of the 90 minutes.

With Carlton Cole and Scott Parker both on the bench, West Ham had some quality in reserve, but Gianfranco Zola elected to keep faith in teenage striker Frank Nouble, employing a five man midfield to nullify Blackburn's physical threat.

It made for a dire first half as the sides cancelled each other out, with neither possessing enough guile to unlock the respective defences.

West Ham did have their moments, notably when Julien Faubert - who had a good game at right back - whipped in a dangerous 14th minute cross which Christopher Samba touched behind for a corner.

And Alessandro Diamanti fired in a fierce free-kick on 33 minutes which Paul Robinson punched clear but that was as close as the Irons came in the first 45 minutes.

Indeed, it was Blackburn who came closest to breaking the deadlock as Morten Gamst Pedersen saw his free kick two minutes before the break thunder off the Hammers crossbar with Green well beaten.

The home side showed more purpose in the second period, with Mark Noble and Alessandro Diamanti combining well on the right to play in Faubert. He fired a cross into the box but the Irons, lacking numbers up front with their 4-5-1 formation, had no-one there to meet it.

The introduction of England striker Carlton Cole just before the hour mark pepped up the Hammers and he was at the heart of most of their better moves for the rest of the game.

But it was Blackburn, well organised by Sam Allardyce, who always threatened to snatch a goal. Martin Olsson saw his fulminating drive from the edge of the box excellently saved by Green, while Jason Roberts wasted the best chance of all when, after outsmarting and outmuscling James Tomkins, he shot weakly at the England keeper.

The key moment had arrived moments before, however, when Carlton Cole cleared off the line, with Blackburn aggrieved not to have been awarded a penalty for Mark Noble's accidental handball.

Diamanti drew a fine save from Robinson with another ferocious free kick, while Parker cut the ball back from the byline only to see it roll unmolested across the goalmouth with no West Ham player able to get into the area to finish the move.

So, it was two points dropped in the Hammers relegation battle and they will need the scoring prowess of Benni McCarthy to boost their chance of avoiding the drop.

Zola admitted his frustrations at his side's performance.

He said: "I was expecting us to create a little bit more quality but we were not able to do that.

"I think the difficulties of the game, the tension, caught us out a little bit and we couldn't express the quality we needed to break them down.

"We knew they were coming here to defend with a lot of players and so they did. When you are facing a team like that you need to have extra quality. You need to be good at maybe taking a player on or getting the right ball into the box.

"Honestly, I don't think we played a very good game, but considering the circumstances, and the other results I consider this to be a good day. We step up the table, which is at least a good thing for us."

West Ham: Green, Faubert, Spector, Upson, Tomkins, Behrami (Parker, 70), Noble, Kovac (Cole, 58), Diamanti, Nouble (Sears, 78), Collison. Unused subs: Stech, Da Costa, Ilunga, Stanislas.

Blackburn: Robinson, Samba, Givet, Nelsen, Chimbonda, Emerton (Andrews, 58) N'Zonzi, Pedersen, Olsson, Diouf (Hoilett, 83), Kalinic (Roberts, 72). Unused subs: Brown, Reid, Di Santo, Salgado.

Booked: Emerton

Attendance: 33,093

Referee: Peter Walton