BT Sport pundit wants West Ham United to lose in Crystal Palace result prediction
Joleon Lescott has predicted that West Ham will beat Crystal Palace at the London Stadium on Sunday but hopes they lose because of his ties to Patrick Vieira.
The pair spent a season together at Manchester City so the BT Sport pundit is pulling for his former teammate when he brings his side to Stratford, but with both sides stronger at home he has tipped the Hammers to be successful.
The Irons as a club got a nice morale boost on Thursday night (3 November) from the 3-0 win over FCSB, with stand out performances from a number of youngsters, but Lescott thinks this one could be tight and has gone for a 2-1 home win.
In his predictions for Live Score he said: “These two teams both seem to do most of their winning at home so you’d have to say West Ham are the favourites.
“The pair also like to do most of their attacking via counter-attacks so it could end up being quite a cagey contest.
“I’ll go for the Hammers but hope I’m wrong for the sake of my old mate Patrick Vieira!”
Bouyant
Ever since the loss at Everton on 18 September to set alarm bells ringing for West Ham the club’s form has been very respectable across the league and Europa Conference League.
The only defeats have been close ones at Liverpool and Manchester United, which is nothing to be ashamed of and could easily have gone another way.
A positive atmosphere was boosted with the midweek win, with the likes of Ollie Scarles proving what talent is waiting in the wings for the future.
Largely that result shouldn’t have a bearing on the Eagles clash considering how many changes will inevitably be made, but the likes of Flynn Downes and Pablo Fornals were excellent and must be confident of keeping their places to take that momentum into the league derby.
Nayef Aguerd can’t be far off his Premier League debut either, as he also looked good against the Romanians, admittedly in not the most taxing circumstances.
They’ve taken there time to begin their climb but West Ham are comfortably in mid-table currently, and are only a win or two from pushing the European places again, so if they could find themselves around that level when the league is suspended for the World Cup, the second half of the season could be much more like what was expected in the summer.