West Ham United v Tottenham Hotspur: Spurs Looking to Extend Unbeaten Start

by Matthew Harris · 30th August 2022

Spurs march on with a 2-0 win at Nottingham Forest on Sunday that extends our unbeaten run to four games. In the early stages of the season, three more points leaves Antonio Conte’s team in third place in the table, just below Manchester City on goal difference.

We now have the first set of midweek games of the new campaign and Wednesday night takes us to old rivals West Ham. The Hammers have started slowly and currently sit in 16th place but their first win, and first points of the season, are likely to have given our opponents some much needed confidence.

Team News

Whenever there’s a quick turnaround, team news is hard to track down. We missed two updates ahead of the Forest game as Lucas Moura and Bryan Gil were both absent from training. Neither made it into the matchday squad so we’ll need to watch out for updates there.

Cristian Romero will remain sidelined while Oliver Skipp was given a faint hope of appearing on Sunday. That didn’t materialise so, perhaps Skippy might just benefit from an extra three days.

At this early stage, it’s simply a case of waiting for the manager’s team news in his pre-match press conference.

Match Odds

Spurs remain favourites but there are odds against figures on all three possible outcomes. The away win is on offer at a top price of 42/41 with VBet while the draw and a victory for West Ham are both available at 14/5.

You can get behind a share of the points at 14/5 with Quinnbet while the same 14/5 on the home win can be found with Unibet.

The Hammers recorded that first win via a 1-0 scoreline away to Aston Villa. Prior to that game, they had lost three in a row to Manchester City, Nottingham Forest and Brighton and Hove Albion.

Form will remain a concern within our opponents’ camp but we know that they have a tendency to raise their game for this fixture.

Side Markets

Harry Kane made it four from four with his brace against Nottingham Forest on Sunday and he starts as the clear favourite to open the scoring on Wednesday night. Harry is available at best industry odds of 4/1 with Unibet while Son Heung-Min follows at 9/2 with VBet.

Richarlison is next at 13/2 with Unibet while other options for Spurs backers include Dejan Kulusevski at 8/1 with Unibet, Lucas Moura at 19/2 with Unibet, Ivan Perisic at 13/1 with VBet and Ryan Sessegnon at 18/1 with Unibet.

Los Angeles, USA – September 10, 2019: Brazilian soccer player Richarlison during International Friendly Soccer match, Brazil vs Peru at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

The first name from within the West Ham camp is Michail Antonio at 17/2 with Unibet, while Tomas Soucek scores useful goals from the back and may be one to watch at 18/1 with 888Sport.

In other side bets, Both Teams to Score is quoted for Wednesday’s game at 4/6 with BetFred and Betway. Spurs have now kept two clean sheets in succession so, if you prefer the ‘no’ option on BTTS, this would convert at 6/5 with Ladbrokes and Coral.

Over in the Total Combined Goals betting, a stake Over the 2.5 line will currently return best odds of 11/14 with VBet. A push up to Over 3.5 will move those figures to a top price of 2/1 with SportNation.

If you prefer to look for a lower scoring encounter, you can switch to Under 2.5 goals which is available at a best of 19/17 with VBet.

That leaves us with our regular look at some Correct Score suggestions. The bookmakers suggest that the probability points to a narrow away win and a 2-1 victory for Spurs is quoted at 15/2 with Betway and Quinnbet.

The same scoreline in favour of the home team can be backed at 11/1 with BetFred and Coral while the 2-2 draw is listed at 12/1 with Quinnbet and VBet.

Last Season

Unfortunately this is another one to forget. It’s interesting that, if you take away Nottingham Forest for obvious reasons, our first four corresponding fixtures from last season all show defeats.

A repeat of those runs would have given us a very contrasting start to the new campaign. Anyway, for the record, the game at the London Stadium in October 2021 produced a 1-0 win for the home side, courtesy of a Michail Antonio goal in the 72nd minute.

Michail Antonio #9 of West Ham United applauds the travelling fans as he is substituted off

We’ve been threatening to change this section and maybe now is the time. A favourite game from the past could be the way to go, so we’ll suggest the 4-3 away win at Upton Park in the 2006/07 season when Paul Stalteri scored the winner in injury time.

If you have a different suggestion, please let us know.

Verdict

Not only did West Ham start the new season with three consecutive defeats, they also failed to register a single goal in that time. It’s not a statistic to suggest a feast of goals on Wednesday night but trends can often be broken in this fixture.

The home side will provide more of an attacking threat and that’s why we’ll kick things off with Both Teams to Score. It carries relatively short odds at 4/6 but they’re not the worst and it should be a solid start.

Over 3.5 goals has a greater risk but, once again, this is a game where recent trends can probably be overlooked.

Finally, our continued backing of Son Heung-Min in the goal scorer markets doesn’t seem to be working. Perhaps it’s time to leave Sonny alone and hope that we can stop jinxing him.

Richarlison could be an option in the anytime betting at 11/5 with Unibet and he may see more game time on Wednesday. That would be our suggestion but we’ll leave all the players alone this time. Instead, we’ll just leave you with these two picks and hope for a high scoring Tottenham win.