Paul Merson predicts result of West Ham United Premier League clash v Crystal Palace
Paul Merson has made his prediction ahead of West Ham United’s Premier League clash with Crystal Palace on Sunday afternoon.
The Hammers claimed a late 2-1 win over Burnley last time out in the league while Palace were beaten by newly promoted Luton, while also losing two key players in Eberechi Eze and Cheick Doucoure to injury.
And speaking to Sportskeeda (30 November), Merson believes those injuries could have an effect on the result of this game and backed David Moyes’ side to claim all three points at the London Stadium.
“West Ham United should win this one,” he wrote. “Crystal Palace have too many injuries. Eberechi Eze is out. He is a massive player for them. If he is not there, they are without their X-factor.
“The Hammers will be way too much for the Eagles. I don’t see Palace grinding it out against West Ham. Moyes’ men got a very good result against Burnley last weekend and will kick on in a similar fashion. West Ham United 3-0 Crystal Palace.”
Opportunity
The performance against Burnley was abysmal for the most part and while we got the three points, that won’t be doable on a regular basis.
To add to that, the performance in midweek in the Europa League against Backa Topola was probably even worse and while there were plenty of changes made to the team that night, we still should have had enough to beat them convincingly.
So hosting Palace will certainly not be an easy game, especially with the way Roy Hodgson likes to set his teams up defensively, but we have got the quality to hurt them if we play to our potential.
Hopefully Jarrod Bowen will be fit and able to return and if he isn’t then hopefully Mohammed Kudus can recover from his illness that saw him miss the game in Serbia, and that would be a big help towards getting all three points.
But we will have to perform far better than we have in recent games, and it’s fair to say that Merson is far more confident than a lot of Hammers fans.
In other West Ham news, Cole “feels sorry for” Irons star after fresh snub by Moyes live on air.