26/01/2019
Deportivo Hammer

The F.A Cup is back for West Ham and a welcome break from all the drama that has been surrounding West Ham at the moment. Will he stay or will he go has now become, he is staying for now. That being said it wouldn’t surprise me if there was another twist in the saga that is Marko Arnautovic.

Last time out the Hammers lost a poor game down at Bournemouth where it seemed missing a 40 million pound striker was enough to put us off our game and put in a so-so performance on the South coast. a game against a lower league team might just be what we need.

For the 2nd time this season we have been drawn against AFC Wimbledon and while the previous game in the League cup didn’t all go our way I do not expect us to have the same problems that we had in that game where we laboured to a 3-1 win with a good 2nd half performance.

It’s not been a great year for AFC Wimbledon they are struggling at the foot of league 1 and 7 points from safety and with a minus 23 goal difference. Playing West Ham might be just what they need to keep a little excitement in their season and I expect their players to be up for a game tomorrow afternoon.

Manuel Pellegrini should be going all out for the Cup this year as most teams should be. I hope that he fields a strong team but would be happy for him to play 1 or 2 of the youngsters in this game.

Injury wise as most of you probably know, Lanzini is back at the training ground and hopefully only another month away from being considered for the squad. Wilshire, Reid, Yarmolenko, Balbuena and Sanchez are all still missing. The other good news is that Ryan Fredericks should feature giving Zabaleta a long deserved rest.

AFC Wimbledon welcome back Kwesi Appiah and Scott Wagstaff from injury. James Hanson will miss out while Steve Seddon is cup-tied.

Predicted Line ups :

AFC Wimbledon : Ramsdale, Watson, Kalambayi, Thomas, Oshilaja, Nightingale, Hartigan, Jervis, Pinnock, Barchem and Piggott.

West Ham United : Adrian, Antonio, Diop, Ogbonna, Masuaku, Diangana, Obiang, Snodgrass, Noble, Carroll and Hernandez.

I’m not going to worry so much about Arnie being missing for this game I would much rather he gets himself ready for the next Premier league game in a couple of days. ​Time will tell what kind of reception he will get but as long as he puts in the performances while he wears Claret and Blue I will not complain. The team really should win comfortably and I’m going to go for a 2-0 win with us able to take our foot off the gas in the last 20 mins with Chicharito getting both goals.