The European championships are gradually coming to an end, and we traditionally announce the most interesting upcoming fights of the English championship. So, in the match of the 35th round of the Premier League, West Ham will host Everton.
West Ham – Everton
Sunday, May 9. London Stadium, London. Chief Arbiter – Stuart Atwell. Live broadcast on Setanta Sports TV channel.
This season West Ham has become a real discovery and at this stage it can rightly compete with Chelsea for the title of the best club in London. Of course, reaching the Champions League final is a serious argument in favor of the “retirees”, but, oddly enough, Arsenal and Tottenham today would clearly lose the competition in the fight for the “London crown” to both of their neighbors.
A year ago, West Ham tried to maintain a residence permit in the top division of England, and the football community laughed at another failure of David Moyes. At that time, no one could have thought that the “hammers”, having certain financial difficulties, would seriously claim a place in the top 4 of the standings and advance to the Champions League. “The magic of Moyes” was even transferred to Jesse Lingard, whom Manchester United had already written off and sent on loan to West Ham, while the Englishman himself scored 9 goals and gave 4 assists in 12 matches for the new club. A logical point in this beautiful story may be the exit of David Moyes’ wards to the Champions League, especially since the calendar of the remaining matches allows us to make this task a reality.
If the successes of West Ham came as a surprise and surprise to many, then Everton’s long-term ambitions to rise to a new level and bring more intrigue to the Merseyside confrontation with Liverpool have been known for a long time. After the very disastrous multimillion-dollar transfers of Alex Iwobi and Moise Keane, the team was awaiting another change of coaching staff. Predictably, with Carlo Ancelotti, the Toffee may finally return to the European competition, but this will have to succeed in a number of difficult remaining matches, the first of which will be the confrontation with West Ham.
I can’t say that Everton is showing some kind of attractive football. Shooting on target once per match is a completely normal story for Ancelotti’s team. And okay, if this did not affect the results in any way, as in the case of West Ham, but Lersisides please their fans with victories only on “holidays”. In the round before last against the crisis Arsenal, the Everton players interrupted their unsuccessful streak, which lasted six matches in a row (3 draws and 3 losses), but in the next match the “toffee” were defeated by Aston Villa. At this stage, any mistake can cost the team very dearly, so if this trend continues, then Everton will have to postpone plans for European competition at least until next season.
According to the bookmakers, the favorite of the upcoming confrontation are the wards of David Moyes. Thus, a coefficient of 2.14 is offered for the victory of West Ham, while the potential success of Everton is estimated at 3.50. The probability of a tie is represented by the odds of 3.55.
Out: Ogbonna, Rice, Masuaku – Gbamen, Hames.
Doubtful: Noble – Dukure.
