West Ham United head to the City Ground to face Nottingham Forest in the first clash between the two sides in any competition in almost ten years. The last time they met was January 2014 in the FA Cup. On that day, Forest recorded a comfortable victory at the City Ground, defeating the East London club 5-0.
Both sides will come into this match on the back of 2-0 defeats last week. West Ham lost their opening day fixture against Manchester City whilst Forest fell to Newcastle at St. James Park. Since their opening day defeat, various media reports have linked West Ham with a host of names in the transfer market. Boma Sosa, Dan Axel Zagadou and Ben Brereton Diaz are amongst a host of names linked with the club this past week.
West Ham at Nottingham Forest FYIs
Kick-off: Saturday, Aug 14, 2pm local, City Ground
West Ham Preview Material: Starting XI Prediction Team News
After Extra Time Podcast: Spotify Apple
Google Result Probability: Forest victory 23% Draw 26% West Ham victory 51%
Watch: USA Network
Starting XI Prediction
With Lukasz Fabianski suffering a worrying hip knock against Man City last weekend, I am going with Alphonse Areola to start this match. In defense, Vladimir Coufal and Aaron Cresswell will start at right and left back, respectively. It surprised me to see Ben Johnson start at center back last week. I expect a returning Craig Dawson to take his place this week, alongside Frenchman Kurt Zouma.
Tomas Soucek and Declan Rice will start in central midfield, with Pablo Fornals starting ahead of them, providing the attacking thrust. Soucek and Rice are world class, and any match in which this duo starts they provide an immense advantage for David Moyes’ men.
In attack, Jarrod Bowen and Said Benrahma provide width. Gianluca Scamacca makes his inaugural start for The Hammers, leading the line.
Match Prediction
This should be a tremendous fixture between two sides with huge followings. If Forest plan to send their fans home happy, they will need to do better than they did last weekend. On the other side, Jesse Lingard will need to make his mark this weekend. The opportunity to rectify that for him falls in a fixture against the side he performed so well for a couple of years ago.
I am backing him in to perform and give Forest their first EPL win this century. Nottingham Forest 2-1
Stuart Kavanagh is a journalist currently residing in Broken Hill, Australia. He writes for the Barrier Truth newspaper, along with being the owner of the sports and entertainment website thepyrrhic.com, He also co-hosts the ‘After Extra Time’ podcast and contributes at edgeofthecrowd.com when time permits.
Football mad, he is always down for debate and discussion at @stueyissickofit on Twitter.