West Ham United will be looking to ease into the second qualifying round of the Europa League this evening after a comfortable 3-0 victory in the home leg of their tie against FC Lusitans last Thursday.

A brace from Diafra Sakho and a James Tomkins header meant the Hammers got their 2015/16 campaign off to a winning start in front of a sell-out crowd, just 40 days after the final match of the last Premier League season.

Slaven Bilic has flown out to Barcelona and will be attending the match once again after leaving academy coach Terry Westley in charge for last week's first leg.

And Westley, who took charge last week and named tonight’s line-up yesterday, commented: “I will expect Slaven to be on the bench. He’s returned from the first-team training camp in Cork and he wants to see players in a competitive game that gives them a chance before he makes major decisions.”

Bilic’s absence from the dugout in the first-leg prompted accusations of disrespect from Lusitans manager Xavi Roura, who angrily told the press: “It does make me sad, in a country where fair play was invented, that something like this could happen.

“I think he must have thought our team was not important for him to be present. I imagine that he has won many titles and maybe he thought he was the ‘Special One’.”

Westley has picked another experimental side for the game, after giving academy products Josh Cullen and Reece Oxford their debuts in the first-leg – the latter becoming the youngest ever player to play for the first tea, at the age of just 16 years and 198 days.

Cullen is in line to make his first start tonight.

Joey O’Brien, one of the few senior players to be involved last week, spoke in the build-up to the second leg and said: “We wanted to go out there and win the game, which we did, and see how many we could get.

“We could have scored more. It was such a great atmosphere, with our fans and a packed stadium, we wanted to do the best we could for them. We will go over there now in similar fashion and make sure we finish what we have started here.”

Last Thursday was the Hammers’ first European tie since their short foray into the UEFA Cup in 2006, when they lost 0-4 to Palermo on aggregate in the first round.

O’Brien is one of those with past experience in Europe and is hoping for similar success with the Hammers. “I played for Bolton when they were in Europe and they were some of the top games to play in,” he enthused.

“If you can get through the early rounds of the competition home and away, it stays with you forever,” he added. O’Brien will be making his 100th appearance for West Ham this evening.

There have already been three new arrivals at Upton Park this summer and Bilic has refused to rule out more new faces: “Our plan is to bring in more players. We are trying to bring in players who we believe can lift us to another stage and make us better.

“We have already signed a few players and brought them into a good team. Sometimes they will click straight away and sometimes it will take a bit of time. We are aware of that and we are going to try and make that adjustment period as short as possible.”

The Croat added: “We are expecting big things with West Ham. We are not big headed and will take it step by step but the early signs are very promising.”

Either Birkirkara of Malta or Ulisses from Armenia lie in wait in round two: the two sides drew 0-0 in the first-leg of their first round qualifying tie last week.

West Ham United XI: Randolph; O’Brien, Tomkins (c), Burke, Page; Amalfitano, Poyet, Cullen, Jarvis; Lee, Sakho