We look ahead to a big Premier League match on Wednesday night at the London Stadium, with our West Ham vs Liverpool prediction and stats preview.
West Ham vs Liverpool: Quick Stats
- Liverpool are predicted to win this game against West Ham by the Opta supercomputer with a 51% chance of victory.
- Only against Arsenal (35) have West Ham lost more Premier League games than they have versus Liverpool (33).
- Diogo Jota has scored four goals in his last two Liverpool appearances after failing to score in each of his previous 32 over a year-long spell.
Match Preview
West Ham United haven’t had the best of times against Liverpool in this competition. Only against Arsenal (35) have West Ham lost more Premier League matches than they have versus Liverpool (33).
Add the fact that David Moyes’ 22 Premier League defeats against the Reds is his joint-most against any opponent across his managerial career, and you’ve basically got all the ingredients for a Liverpool away win in this encounter, right?
That would usually be the case, but this Liverpool side have struggled to impress in 2022-23 so far. Their 50 points from 31 games is their worst record at this stage of a season since 2015-16 – their first under Jürgen Klopp, while even if they win every one of their remaining seven games of the season, they’ll still have 21 points fewer than they finished with last season (92).
West Ham are also going to fall short of their points tallies in great 2020-21 (65 points) and 2021-22 (56) campaigns. Even if they win their final seven games of this season, they can only finish with 55 points at most. A busy UEFA Europa Conference league campaign hasn’t helped, but with survival very likely now and a European semi-final to look forward to for a second successive season, the feeling is that they have balanced 2022-23 out in their favour, eventually.
This game will see the manager with the third most Premier League wins – Moyes (253) – come up against the boss with the third-highest points-per-game of those to take charge of 100+ matches in the competition – Jürgen Klopp (2.10). Liverpool could hand a first start since October to Luis Díaz but will be missing the trio of Stefan Bajcetic, Naby Keita and Roberto Firmino through injury in this match, while hosts West Ham will be without striker Gianluca Scamacca with a knee injury.
Last Meeting
Liverpool 1-0 West Ham: 19 October 2022 (Premier League)
Liverpool recorded their 33rd Premier League win over West Ham back in October 2022 – their outright most against a single opponent in the competition at the time (since equalled versus Newcastle). The 1-0 victory was secured thanks to Darwin Núñez’s header past Łukasz Fabiański – Liverpool’s 100th Premier League goal against the Hammers, the fourth club that they have reached the century against.
West Ham had the chance to equalise before half-time, but Jarrod Bowen’s penalty was saved by Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson.
Recent Form
West Ham will be looking to win consecutive Premier League games for just the second time this season (previously in October), after their 4-0 win at Bournemouth last time out. However, the Hammers have only won two of their last 20 games against opponents starting the day in the top half of the Premier League table (D5 L13), and both of those victories were against Fulham.
Across all competitions, West Ham are unbeaten in five games, following two wins against Fulham and Bournemouth and a draw at home to Arsenal in the Premier League coupled with a draw and win in their UEFA Europa Conference League quarter-final tie against Gent. Michail Antonio has scored three goals across the last two of these games.
Overall, West Ham have won the same number of matches in the Premier League (nine of 31) as they have in the Europa Conference League (nine of 10 – excluding qualifiers) this season.
Liverpool have won their last two competitive games with wins against Leeds (6-1) and Nottingham Forest (3-2). They haven’t won three in a row since before the 2022 World Cup, when they secured three in a row back in October – the third win in that sequence came against West Ham at Anfield.
The Reds scored more goals in their 6-1 win in their last away league match against Leeds than they had in their previous eight on the road combined (4 – W1 D2 L5). Only once this season have they won consecutive away league games, doing so in November/December against Spurs and Aston Villa.
Klopp’s side have won just one of their six Premier League away games against London sides this season (D3 L2), beating Tottenham Hotspur 2-1 in November. Having scored in 27 consecutive league games in the capital between August 2018 and January this year, Liverpool’s last two visits have both finished 0-0.
Key Players
West Ham: Declan Rice
No player has a bigger impact on David Moyes’ West Ham side than captain Declan Rice. The England international is the heartbeat of the side, patrolling and controlling their midfield. It’s likely that he’ll come up against international team-mate Jordan Henderson at the London Stadium, too.
He leads all West Ham players across the 2022-23 Premier League campaign for completed passes (50), interceptions (1.7) and average carry progress (103m) on a per 90 basis, while only Lucas Paquetá (2.9), Tomás Soucek (2.5) and Vladimír Coufal (2.4) have averaged more tackles per 90 than Rice (2.3).
He’s scored in his last two appearances versus Gent and Bournemouth – the first time that he’s ever scored in consecutive appearances for the Hammers and only the second time that he’s scored more than one goal in a single month of action (the other was in September 2021).
Liverpool: Diogo Jota
Diogo Jota – who has lost none of the 35 Premier League games he’s scored in – has scored braces in each of his last two appearances for Liverpool. The last player to net two or more goals in more consecutive league games for the Reds was Luis Suárez in December 2013 when he had a run of four, with the second game in that run coming against West Ham.
Jota’s recent form in front of goal has arrived following a terrible spell. The Portuguese failed to score in 32 successive appearances in all competitions, spanning just over a year – this despite attempting 45 shots over that period. His last two games have seen him score four goals from nine shots.
Jota still has the fourth-most goal involvements for Liverpool across all competitions this season (12), below only Mohamed Salah (38), Darwin Núñez (19) and Roberto Firmino (16), while he has two more than full-back pairing Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andrew Robertson (10) and double the number of Cody Gakpo (six).
West Ham vs Liverpool Prediction
Liverpool are strong favourites to defeat West Ham on Wednesday night in this Premier League clash ahead of kick-off, with the Opta supercomputer giving them a 51% chance of victory at the London Stadium.
West Ham have a 22.6% chance of winning the game to help move up the table, after pretty much ruling themselves out of the relegation battle. After this weekend’s win at Bournemouth, they are being given just a 0.1% chance of dropping to the Championship, with seven clubs having a higher chance: Wolves (0.7%), Bournemouth (4.1%), Leicester (30.6%), Leeds (37.7%), Everton (55.8%), Nottingham Forest (79.2%) and Southampton (91.5%).
At the start of the season, Liverpool were tipped as Premier League favourites, just ahead of Manchester City. This hasn’t played out how most people imagined. As it stands, Liverpool’s quest for a top-four spot and UEFA Champions League football in 2023-24 is all but over now, with the Opta supercomputer giving them just a 8.1% chance of doing so. This is lower than top-four certainties Arsenal & Man City, while Man Utd (94.7%) and Newcastle (89.3%) are nearly assured of UCL football next season. Liverpool’s chances are just a shade higher than Brighton’s 6.4%, while Tottenham are all but out of the running now (1.3%).
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