West Ham v Birmingham City preview

I think I’ve used the term ‘must win’ a few times this season, but I see tomorrow night’s fixture against Birmingham as a definite must win for the Hammers.  And this time, there can be no excuses, with the new players we have settling in, the lads at home in front of the floodlights, it’s set up to send the midlanders home with nothing more than a few bruised shins.

David Sullivan has certainly expressed his desire to win, saying “I was at Birmingham City for years and it was great – but I really want to whack them”.  No ambiguity in that statement then!  But it would be great for the players to pay back some of the stability that Gold and Sullivan have given us by giving their old club a stuffing.

Birmingham have had a fantastic run of late, but watching them on Sunday against Wolves, you get the impression they are beatable.  For me, they are this season’s Everton, an average Premier League team who have been well organized and churning out a stable team that brings results.  As long as we keep our eye on Kevin Phillips for the whole game and stop them scoring, I think we can pip it.

My line up would be;

Green

Illunga – Upson – Tomkins – Spector

Stanislas – Parker – Behrami – Faubert

Cole – Mccarthy

Bench: Kurucz, Da Costa, Daprela, Noble, Mido, Ilan and Collison

This would give us some natural width with two decent target men up front we need to be getting some balls in the box.  It’s also a strong bench with impact players who can come on as well as some who can provide stability.

I’m feeling fairly good about the game and reckon we can pull away as 3-0 winners with Cole being the star of the show.  You can get 22/1 for that with Sky Bet plus a free £10 bet when you bet, so go for a double?  We really need this one to get out of the bottom 3 quagmire, I really hope the players are up for it, we’ve really got to get behind the lads, come on you Irons!!!

Comments

[PeoriaHammerFan]

Congrats on the victory, looking forward to the match against Hull. It would be nice to put some more distance between us and relegation. Come on you Hammers!

[TBI]

Two wins on the bounce?