West Ham United boss Sam Allardyce says looming tests against Chelsea and Arsenal holds no fear for them.

Saturday's comfortable win over Leicester - courtesy of goals from Andy Carroll and Stewart Downing - consolidated West Ham's place in the top four going into the Boxing Day visit to Stamford Bridge.

"We challenge Chelsea and Arsenal on the back of what we've done up until now," said Allardyce.

"It eases the pressure on us, the fact we can go there and see if we can go and challenge ourselves against two of the big boys in this league and see if we can get any points off them.

"We've earned the right to go to try to see if we can do that. As difficult as it might be, I think the lads are confident enough to think they may have the capabilities of doing it.

"If we don't, it's not going to be too much of a knock back for us, because we know we can catch up by beating teams who are below us, like Leicester and teams like that, which we've done particularly well this year. "It's a nice time, I think, for us to be playing Chelsea and Arsenal."