West Ham United FC v Liverpool

Last Six Games

	West Ham	v	Liverpool
West Ham 3 Chelsea 1	-	-	-	Udinese 0 Liverpool 0
Man Utd 1 West Ham 0	-	-	-	Liverpool 1 Southampton 0
Squirts 3 West Ham 1	-	-	-	Tottenham 2 Liverpool 1
West Ham 1     Stoke City 1	-	-	-	Swansea 0 Liverpool 0
Newcastle 0 West Ham 1	-	-	-	Liverpool 0 Young Boys 0
West Ham 0 Man City 0	-	-	-	Liverpool 3 Wigan 0

West Ham United will be aiming to maintain their impressive return to the Premier League on Sunday against a Liverpool side looking to prove they can cope without Luis Suarez.

Sam Allardyce's side have collected 22 points from their opening 15 games since winning promotion and recorded an excellent 3-1 home victory over Chelsea last weekend.

Only Arsenal have beaten West Ham at Upton Park this season and the hosts will be hoping to repeat the 3-1 victory over Liverpool in the club's last meeting in East London.

Scott Parker and Demba Ba were two of the goalscorers that day, but have since moved on, while Liverpool's last win at West Ham was a 3-2 success back in September 2009 which was secured by the now departed Fernando Torres and Dirk Kuyt.

Carlton Cole, who scored the last time the two clubs met, will be given the chance to lead the line in the absence of Andy Carroll, who is on loan from Liverpool, but would have been ineligible to play irrespective of his current injury.

Liverpool have lost just once in 10 Premier League games, but have still only won once on their travels this term and sit 11th in the table ahead of the weekend's programme.

A Suarez hat-trick earned that solitary away triumph at Norwich, but the Uruguayan, who has scored over half of the Reds' league goals, is missing through suspension.

West Ham United FC

West Ham boss Allardyce will welcome Yossi Benayoun back into his squad to face Liverpool in the Premier League on Sunday.

The former Reds midfielder missed the Hammers' 3-1 win over Chelsea as he was ineligible to appear against his parent club.

Andy Carroll (knee) could be missing for two months but would not have been able to feature against Liverpool due to the terms of his loan, whilst Ricardo Vaz Te (shoulder), Alou Diarra (thigh) and Jack Collison (knee) are all definitely out.

Liverpool

Liverpool striker Suarez is suspended for Sunday's trip to West Ham after accumulating five bookings.

Manager Brendan Rodgers has played midfielder Jonjo Shelvey in a 'false nine' position before and could do so again as a stop-gap with no other senior strikers fit.

Captain Steven Gerrard, left out of the Europa League squad which beat Udinese in Italy because of illness, will be restored at Upton Park as will the rested Daniel Agger and Lucas Leiva.

the scouse have put out a full team tonight in the Europa league, few injuries always welcome

Good stuff, hope they get a hammerimg and some injuries (none life threatening! ) and is it right the racist little git is out on Sunday as well?

Good stuff, hope they get a hammerimg and some injuries (none life threatening! ) and is it right the racist little git is out on Sunday as well?

Yep the buck-toothed grass-muncher picked up his 5th booking last game

They're scared of us.....

Putting out the A team, gives them some great excuses after they lose to the mighty Irons on Sunday :party:

3 points from the bin dippers, no problem

Sahin picked up an injury so i would expect their lone striker to be jonjo shelvey , our back line should have more than enough to deal with him

Oh no not 'the hills have eyes' he'll frighten the children

I bloody hate Giraffe. Really hate him.
His shooting goes into orbit other than when he plays against us.
Big northern carthorse.

Was hoping that we would have a walk in the park this weekend. I even had us down for a 3 - 1 win in the predictor, but the closer we get to Sunday the less easy I feel about this game.

With Collison, Diarra, and Vaz Te out from injury and Carroll injured but would not have been able to play due to loan contract conditions, we are well depleted.

Suarez is obviously out but Gerrard is in and probably Agger will be available for the pool. basically a full team available to play. I am sure that Rodgers has catered for the absence of Suarez anyway.

I expect that Fat Sam is doing his bit in motivating the lads as well, but I still have this horrible feeling ...

Nicked

A big thank you to Vital West Ham editor Rossy for agreeing to answer the following questions ahead of the game for us...

Q. How has your season gone so far and where do you expect to finish?
I'd say, so far, it has gone quite well. Getting promoted from the Championship our aim was to simply ensure we stayed up. As it turned out we got off to our best start, in the Premier League, ever. Results have dipped recently but we've been mixing it with the likes of United, Spurs and Chelsea with the latter being soundly beaten last weekend. As for where we'll finish, I'd be more than happy with a top half finish, anything else would be a bonus.

Q. Who are the West Ham player(s) we should look out for?
If I were to select two, I'd go for Mark Noble and Kevin Nolan. The former is vastly under-rated and his ball-wining abilities are what keep us ticking over. As for the latter, he's got this knack of being in the right place at the right time and his goals are a vital ingredient of our ongoing season.

Q. How has Andy Carroll been getting on during his loan spell from Liverpool?
He started off great, the fans were right behind him but then he picked up an injury. On his return he settled back down well but despite his enormous efforts he couldn't get on the score sheet. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, he scored in the 3-1 defeat to Spurs at White Hart Lane. Unfortunately, he's now picked up a knee injury and is sidelined until the New Year.

Q. What have you made of Liverpool so far this season and where do you expect us to finish?
I've not seen much of you to be honest but what I have seen it appears you are heading in the right direction. But progress takes time and I'm not sure time it's something many Premier League clubs give their managers these days. As for predicting a finish, I'll opt for seventh!

Q. Do you believe Brendan Rodgers was the right man for the job and will prove a success long-term?
I guess it comes back to that thing called time! Will Rodgers be given the time to turn things around or is there an urge for instant success? Whilst Rodgers was a success, relatively, at Swansea, it shouldn't be forgotten that he struggled at Watford and Reading. Therefore, as far as I'm concerned the jury is still out.

Q. Which Liverpool player(s) do you rate the most and why?
I'd opt for Steven Gerrard! Although he's approaching the twilight years of his career, he can still boss a game with his drive, sheer hard w**k and ability to influence maters.

Q. What is your probable line up for the game and how do you think you can be successful against Liverpool?
I reckon West Ham's line-up will be something like: Jaaskelainen, Demel, Reid, Tomkins, O'Brien, Nolan, Diame, Noble, O`Neil, Jarvis, Cole.

As for being successful, if we can keep it tight, not make any mistakes and take our chances, it might be a case of job done.

Q. What's your prediction for the result?
I'll be brave and opt for a Hammers win, by the only goal of the game.

This is hard one for me , At the start of the season I would of been happy with a point against Liverpool at home but tbh i would be dissapointed if we didnt pick all 3 points today ,

Think if we start with the same tempo as we did against chelsea in the 2nd half we will get the 3points no problems

Iam going 2-1 West ham ( Gerrard for them and Nolan and Cole for us )

The problem is though Arran , we only play one half , if Sam could get the team to play both halves we would be a problem for most teams in the Prem .

Just read that the Blackwall tunnel is closed north bound dude to an accident COYFI

If i was BFS i would go for a 4-5-1/4-3-3
Jussi
Demel
Collins
Reid
O`Brien*
Benayoun*
Noble
Diame
Nolan
Jarvis
Cole
BENCH:Spiegel,O`Neil,Taylor,Maiga,Moncur,McCartney,Tomkins

*If McCartney is fit enough to start then start him ahead of O`Brien at LB
*If Benayoun is not fit enough to start then swap him with Maiga

Admin wrote:Just read that the Blackwall tunnel is closed north bound dude to an accident COYFI

Thanks for letting me know.

Has to be match day.

I'm out at a family do this aft.

Any text updates would be greatly appreciated.

Just found this aswell : [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Sounds like their may be alot of fans late to the game today then ....

COYI ....... 3 points please lads

3 pints would be nice
arsenal
everton
wba

coming up , we need to keep the w**k ethic going and make sure we are still in touch of 10th place after those games

West Ham United:Jaaskelainen,Demel,Reid,Collins,O`Brien,Noble,Nolan,Diame,Jarvis,Taylor,Cole
West Ham Subs:Spiegel,McCartney,Tomkins,Spence,O`Neil,Moncur,Maiga

Liverpool:Reina,Johnson,Skrtel,Agger,Enrique,Lucas,Allen,Gerrard,Downing,Sterling,Shelvey
Liverpool subs:Jones,Cole,Henderson,Coates,Carragher,Suso,Morgan

See you all at half time for some feedback COYI