West Ham have been tipped to continue their current struggles when the Hammers head to Watford in the Premier League.
Irons’ boss David Moyes will be without talismanic midfielder Declan Rice for the clash after the 22-year-old picked up his fifth booking of the season in the first half against Southampton.
Having made a strong start to the season, West Ham are now without a win in five matches across all competitions and will be hoping to put things right at Vicarage Road.
Writing for his weekly BBC Sport prediction column, Mark Lawrenson has tipped the poor form to continue.
This is the first time Watford have played since 10 December while West Ham have had four games since then, and not won any of them. The Hornets have been hampered by being unable to train properly because of a Covid outbreak at the club but they will be rested and ready for this one. The Hammers seem to be playing every other day, and they have been losing a lot of the time. They are clearly missing injured duo Angelo Ogbonna and Kurt Zouma at the back and it might be that their poor run continues until they can bring in more numbers in January.
Lawrenson backed Watford to prevail 2-1 and pile more misery onto an out of sorts West Ham side.
Moyes also looks set to be without Aaron Cresswell as the 31-year-old left-back continues to recover from a back issue.
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Almost regardless of availability, this is a game the Irons have to be targeting to get their campaign back on track.
Despite a mini-revival following the arrival of Claudio Ranieri, the hosts look to be fighting a battle against relegation whilst Moyes’ men want to push for Europe.
If those European hopes are to continue, the Hammers simply cannot afford to leave empty handed.
