Manchester United will be relatively healthy when they head to The Hawthorns for a Premier League clash against West Brom on Sunday. The Baggies, sit in 17th place right down their in the drop zone. They are now led by Alan Pardew, United’s boogie down adversary from the 2016 FA Cup Final, when he was boss at Crystal Palace.
While West Brom are fixated on picking up points any which way they can in order to stay up, United are trying to pretty much stay perfect, and hope that their arch-rivals Manchester City drop points here and there.
If we’re going to have any kind of title race at all this season, the margin of error for United is next to nothing.
The Red Devils will be without their ace Paul Pogba in this one, as the Frenchman finishes out his three match ban on Sunday. However, midfield mate Marouane Fellaini may return finally. The Belgian has certainly had an injury-riddled 2017-18 season.
Also returning to action, possibly, is defender Marcos Rojo, who picked up a massive and nasty head wound in the Manchester Derby on Sunday.
In our starting XI prediction, we went with Scott McTominay to solve the selection crisis in midfield, and we based that on what Manager Jose Mourinho had to say about the 21-year-old becoming a regular first team contender now.
Michael Carrick remains a long term absentee due to his heart condition, but the real injury news of the week revolves around Eric Bailly. United manager Jose Mourinho revealed that the central defender has a very serious injury, and it is feared that he could be lost for the season.
On the flip side, WBA are worrying about the fitness of Gareth Barry and Matt Phillips. The former is struggling with a thigh injury while the latter has a hamstring issue. The same muscle group is ailing Nacer Chadli, who is ruled out.
MUFC Starting XI Prediction: go to this link
Odds via Paddy Power: United 4/7, Draw 3/1, West Bromwich Albion 5/1
Prediction: United 2, West Bromwich Albion 0
As always, feel free to post your own MUFC starting XI and match score predictions in the comments section below.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV and the Tribune company’s blogging community Chicago Now.
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