The Hammers take on a Bournemouth side that will likely be in inspired form after their promising performance in Monday’s frustrating 1-0 defeat to Liverpool. The Cherries looked solid at the back and created 4 more chances than Liverpool. Benteke’s 26th minute goal should have been ruled offside, and Bournemouth deserved at least a point.
West Ham will approach this match with attacking, controlling football, and hopefully learn from the first half mistakes that were made in the defeat to Leicester. Defensively the team were poor, leaving large gaps at the
back when attacking, which allowed the Foxes to counter attack efficiently, and lead to the first goal from Shinji Okazaki. Full-backs Aaron Cresswell and Carl Jenkinson looked very weak, and were consistently being passed by Leicester’s wingers. Another player who did not look up for it was Diafra Sakho, who had a golden opportunity at 1-2 to level the scores which was fired straight at goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel. The striker looked very weak on the ball and constantly was running into danger. Finally, the less said about Adrian’s red card calamity the better.
Mauro Zarate will not be included in the match-day squad due to a short-term injury, which he confirmed over Twitter will keep him out of action for up to 2 weeks. A lack of replacements for Mauro, means that Modibo Maiga is likely to start up top alongside Diafra Sakho. An option Bilic could look at is Argentine loanee Manuel Lanzini, who has proved he can bring pace and creativity to the side. Another key player that will be missing on Saturday is Adrian – whose appeal against the red card he picked up in the dying minutes of the 2-1 defeat to Leicester was overruled by the FA. Darren Randolph is likely to start, with Raphael Spiegel set to be on the bench.
Bournemouth are likely to line up in a 4-2-3-1 formation and could start new boy Max Gradel on the right, with Championship hero Matt Ritchie behind Callum Wilson, and Eunan O’Kane, fresh from news of his Republic of Ireland international call up, completing the attacking midfield. New signing and Premier League veteran Sylvain Distin could also make his debut at centre-back. It could be a tough fixture for the Hammers against a side still looking for their first Premier League goal of all time. Kick off is at 3pm at Upton Park.
