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West Ham United boss David Moyes missed the point when defending co-owners David Sullivan and David Gold this week.

The Scot has talked a lot of sense when it comes to transfers both during his first spell at West Ham and again during this window in his second spell.

First time around he said the club must look to build a young, hungry team. He also made it clear the scouting of players prior to signing them needed to be vastly improved.

Moyes talks sense over transfers

This time around he is again focused on building a team to last and putting an end to West Ham’s scattergun approach to transfers.

Read: David Moyes transfer comments are the most sensible thing to come out of West Ham for years

But he got things wrong when he defended the ambition of Sullivan and Gold in an interview with The Telegraph.

Thousands of West Ham fans gathered to protest against the owners ahead of Saturday’s draw with Everton.

One of the many grievances those fans have is a lack of ambition and structured, sound recruitment.

Moyes told The Telegraph he felt the owners had shown ambition.

Moyes defends Gold and Sullivan ambition with £160million claim

“The thing about showing ambition, I think the owners have spent about £160million in the last two transfer windows,” Moyes told The Telegraph.

“So you would have to say, maybe they [the fans] want it to be more or better, but I don’t think you could say it wasn’t for them trying to spend the money.

“I think they have and they’ve said to me if the right player comes along this month we’ll do it.”

But Moyes has got his Sullivan and Gold figures all wrong.

West Ham have spent a paltry £25million NET in the last two transfer windows.

True £25m net spend over last two windows at the heart of West Ham’s problems

And that has left the squad woefully short in crucial areas.

In fairness to Moyes he has not been back at the club long and has had a lot to contend with in a short space of time.

So he may not be fully up to speed with the balance sheet.

Indeed it is not always about how much money you spend, but how you spend it.

And West Ham have bought poorly while also trying to be frugal.

The owners forced former manager Manuel Pellegrini to sell players in order to buy in the summer.

And that saw 11 departures and just six arrivals – only two of whom were brought in as potential first team players in the shape of Pablo Fornals and Sebastien Haller.

It will be interesting to see how Moyes goes about building HIS West Ham team, providing of course he keeps the club up this season.

That is by no means a given at this stage.