Paul Merson tips Michail Antonio to do damage in West Ham vs Southampton result
Paul Merson has predicted West Ham to continue their revival with a win against Southampton at St Mary’s this Sunday.
Two wins on the bounce has lifted the Hammers up to 13th in the Premier League table, while the Saints are three points back in 17th, just outside the relegation zone and on a run of four straight defeats heading into this meeting (16 October).
Sky Sports pundit Merson has predicted it to be a fairly tight 2-1 away win to the Irons, with the one-two punch of Gianluca Scamacca and Michail Antonio key to the proceedings after they both netted against Fulham on 9 October.
In his Sportskeeda predictions column this week he said: “Gianluca Scamacca looks like a good signing for West Ham. They took a big call to keep Michail Antonio out, but he came on and scored his goal as well.
“He has been struggling a little bit, but he can come on against tiring defenders and do major damage.”
Run
The contrasting form suggests that West Ham should really be able to make this a comfortable victory, and were they closer to where everybody expected them to be going into the campaign the prediction would no doubt reflect that.
As it is, David Moyes’ side have had a difficult couple of months, with the first win against Aston Villa back on 28 August proving to be a false dawn.
But the form has certainly improved in the past couple of weeks, and Scamacca is starting to show why the club spent £35.5million on him in the summer, and Kylian Mbappe is so upset to not be playing with him.
If he can add to his scoring run in the league, and Antonio is brought on later to terrorise the home defence as Merson expects, then there is every chance this is another three points.
Moyes really needs to get as many wins under his belt as possible before the World Cup break to improve the whole outlook of the season, as things were starting to look ugly after the defeat at Everton on 18 September.
But there are some signs that the difficulties that plagued the early weeks of the season are starting to clear as the summer signings get comfortable and start to find some form, so that needs to continue on the south coast.