Premier League: Crystal Palace vs West Ham match preview
A look ahead to Saturday’s Premier League fixture at Selhurst Park
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Your support makes all the difference.It has hardly been a seamless start to the season for Crystal Palace. Firstly their boss Tony Pulis jumped ship just days before the start of the new campaign. Now, the man they had lined up as a replacement, Malky Mackay, has been embroiled in controversy following the exposure of a series of offensive messages. Add in the resignation of Palace’s director of football Iain Moody, who is also implicated in the allegations, along with the fine for spying on Cardiff’s team sheet last season, and you have a sure-fire recipe for unrest.
West Ham will be licking their lips at facing a manager-less side in such turmoil but Palace showed against Arsenal that they’re not about to crumble; that the defensive rigidity drilled into them by Pulis has not vanished in his absence.
West Ham aren’t without troubles of their own. Sam Allardyce is the bookmakers’ favourite to be the next Premier League manager to get the sack. Conceding a late winner against London rivals must have been galling, and only adds to the pressure on Allardyce to get three points this weekend against considerably weaker opposition.
For both sides it’s a consecutive London derby and a highly charged start to the season. A win for either would settle the tumult whilst heaping it on their neighbour.
KICK-OFF: Saturday, 3pm
PAST THREE MEETINGS…
West Ham 0 Crystal Palace 1 (Jedinak), Premier League, April 2014
Crystal Palace 1 (Chamakh) West Ham 0, Premier League, December 2013
West Ham 0 Crystal Palace 0, Championship, February 2012
STATS…
West Ham haven’t beaten Palace in six matches, a run going back to 2003.
Palace have kept a clean sheet in five of their last six encounters with West Ham in all competitions.
West Ham have lost six of their last seven Premier League matches.
Palace have conceded at least two goals in each of their last four Premier League games.
ODDS…
Palace to win: 2.45
West Ham to win: 2.9
Draw: 3.2
TV:
Highlights on BBC1 at 10.30pm.
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