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In one of the rescheduled fixtures from a COVID ravaged festive fixture period, Leicester City plays host to Tottenham Hotspur at the King Power Stadium.
Meetings between these two sides are usually pretty high-scoring. Since Leicester returned to the top flight in 2014, Leicester vs Tottenham is the fourth-highest scoring fixture in the Premier League with 54 goals.
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Tottenham Hotspur travels to the King Power Stadium to take on Leicester City in a midweek fixture. It is a rearranged fixture that was supposed to take place in December because of a COVID outbreak within the Leicester squad. In an interesting twist of fate, neither side played at the weekend because of COVID outbreaks in their respective oppositions squads.
Tottenham has been resurgent since the appointment of Italian mastermind Antonio Conte and could bridge the gap to the top four with a victory here.
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Manchester City welcomes Chelsea to the Etihad Stadium this weekend. The Sky Blues will take on the Blues, hoping to win their twelfth straight Premier League fixture. Victory here would almost certainly guarantee the Citizen’s fourth Premier League title in five years.
A loss in this matchup would be terminal to Chelsea’s feint title chances. After being the pacesetters in the early stages of the competition, The Pensioners form has been middling. Believe it or not, their current Premier League form stinks!
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Liverpool hosts Arsenal in the first leg of the EFL Cup semi-finals, after a one-week postponement. The Gunners and the Reds always seem to face each other in this competition. This is the first time in over 30 years that two top-flight sides have faced each other in three straight League Cup campaigns. This year, the stakes get a little higher as they face each other in the semi-finals.
The Gunners have enjoyed an easy run to the semi-finals. They have scored 16 goals and conceded just one. I must note that the only Premier League opposition they have faced in this run was Leeds United.
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After a postponement, because of a COVID-19 outbreak in the Liverpool squad, Arsenal’s League Cup first leg semi-final is due to be played this week.
Liverpool coach Jurgen Klopp said most of the positive coronavirus tests that led to the original fixture being rescheduled were false positives, and that was met with skepticism by Arsenal fans. The EFL still decided that it would not investigate the incident however, and that Liverpool had no case to answer.
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Spurs play host to Chelsea in an all-London EFL Cup semi-final. This is a revenge mission for Spurs. In order for them to progress to the final, they must avenge their defeat in the first leg last week against the reigning European Champions. Last week’s first leg was the fourth time that Spurs have lost a first leg League Cup semi-final tie.
The first two times that this occurred they were eliminated from the competition. The latter two times they progressed to the final. Interestingly, the last time this happened was against Chelsea, in the 2001/02 season.
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Tottenham Hotspur plays host to Chelsea in the second leg of their Carabao Cup semi-final tie tomorrow. Spurs will hope to turn around a 2-0 deficit from the first leg at Stamford Bridge. The first leg was a night to forget for Tottenham fans as they were thoroughly and comprehensively outplayed by Chelsea.
Truthfully, they were lucky to escape with only a two-goal deficit. Upon his return to Stamford Bridge, former Chelsea now Tottenham coach Antonio Conte admitted after the match that the gap in quality between the two sides was vast.
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West Ham faces a sharp turnaround with a midweek clash against relegation candidates Norwich City in the Premier League. The Hammers did do the double over the Canaries in the 2019/20 season. Prior to that, they had struggled to take all three points against Norwich, with six draws in the previous ten meetings between the two sides.
Norwich City has an awful record when traveling to face West Ham. Their last away victory over the Irons came in the late 1980s. Their last victory of any kind against West Ham came in 2013 by a 3-1 margin at Carrow Road.
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After confirming their place in the fourth round of the FA Cup with a victory over Leeds, there’s no rest for West Ham United as they turn their attention to Norwich City and the Premier League.
This fixture was due to be played prior to Christmas, until it became one of the many games postponed because of COVID-19. The Hammers’ hierarchy envisioned this match being rescheduled during the forthcoming winter break. Instead, it was handed a midweek time slot, giving West Ham less than 72 hours to prepare.
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West Ham United faces Leeds United in what should be an exciting encounter between two Premier League sides at opposite ends of the table.
West Ham seems to have turned around a horrid run of form with two consecutive victories over the New Year. Those victories have seen them catapult themselves back amongst the top four contenders. As it stands, only one solitary point separates the Hammers from a spot in the top four.
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After back-to-back wins over the New year period, West Ham switches their focus to the FA Cup. Unlike some of their fellow London sides, the Irons won’t face lower league opposition. They will face fellow Premier League side Leeds United.
Incredibly, it will be the first time in over 90 years these two sides have faced each other in the cup. Their last FA Cup meeting happened in 1930 and resulted in a 4-1 win to the East London club. West Ham does not have an outstanding record in the cup when they face fellow Premier League sides.
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The Gunners face Nottingham Forest at the City Ground this weekend in FA Cup action. The North Londoners will look to avenge a surprise defeat to the Reds at the same stage of this competition back in the 2017/18 season.
After a fantastic run of form, Manchester City undid Arsenal in their first game of 2022. A Riyad Mahrez penalty and Gabriel red card within two minutes of each other undid any good work the Gunners had done in the first half and handed the momentum to the reigning Premier League champions. Arsenal will look to bounce straight back from that defeat.
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