West Ham will be aiming to win consecutive Premier League games for the first time since August when they face fellow London club Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park on Boxing day.
Following a promising start to the 2019/20 campaign, the Hammers’ form has taken a turn for the worse in recent months.
Manuel Pellegrini’s side are currently sitting sixteenth – four points clear of the relegation zone.
West Ham won three of their first six league games this season, but just two victories in their last 11 top-flight matches have left manager Pellegrini fighting to save his job.
Still, after beating Southampton in their previous game, the Hammers will be confident of picking up more points against an out-of-form Palace side.
The Eagles have failed to win any of their last three games, and Roy Hodgson’s men have scored just one goal in that time.
A narrow victory over Bournemouth at the beginning of the month was followed by back-to-back draws with Watford and Brighton, before Newcastle beat Palace in the previous round.
This poor run of results has seen Palace drop into the bottom half of the table. Hodgson’s side are twelfth – four points ahead of West Ham.
Only bottom club Watford have scored fewer goals than Palace in the Premier League this season. However, just three sides have a better defensive record.
Liverpool, Leicester and Sheff Utd are the only teams that have conceded fewer goals than the Eagles in the division.
West Ham have dominated the head-to-head record between the two teams in recent years.
Palace beat the Hammers 2-1 back in October, but this was the Eagles’ first win in this fixture in nine attempts.
It’s also worth pointing out that three of the last five meetings between the two sides have ended level.
Palace will welcome back Mamadou Sakho on Thursday after the defender completed his three-match ban.
However, key men Gary Cahill and Andros Townsend missed the defeat to Newcastle, and both players are now expected to spend lengthy spells on the sidelines.
Ryan Fredericks is suspended for West Ham, while Lukasz Fabianksi, Jack Wilshire and Manuel Lanzini are all close to returning to first-team action.
This fixture hasn’t produced too many goals in recent seasons, so we could be set for another low-scoring encounter this time around.
Forebet predicts that the points will be shared, with neither side managing to score more than 1.5 goals.