Newcastle United Match Preview

West Ham United haven’t won on the opening day of a Premier League season since their 2-0 away win at Arsenal in August 2015. Given their tough run of fixtures up until the next international break, they will be hoping to get off to a good start when Newcastle United arrive in Stratford for today’s late kick-off.

Steve Bruce’s side have a good record here, having won two of their previous three fixtures though David Moyes will be hoping to start his first full season in charge by claiming victory, thus getting revenge for the last time he was involved in this fixture as Rafael Benitez led the Magpies to a 3-2 victory back in December 2017.

Head-Coach Bruce wouldn’t mind a similar outcome to last November’s corresponding fixture, as his side raced into an early two-goal lead before adding to that total in the early stages of the second-half, only for Manuel Pellegrini’s Hammers to stage a late comeback. The visitors did however hold on to win the game 3-2.

West Ham will want to make amends for their 5-3 defeat to Sky Bet Championship side AFC Bournemouth in their betway Cup match last Saturday.

As per the end of the last campaign, the matches will continue to be played behind closed doors for the time being so the Claret and Blue Army won’t be able to cheer their team on.

Tomáš Souček is available for this match despite self isolating after international duty. Felipe Anderson and Declan Rice could also feature.

After missing the final game of last season due to injury, Aaron Cresswell could be welcomed back into defence. While there may also be a start for Robert Snodgrass who hasn’t featured since March due to a back problem.

The match is an 8pm kick-off and it was announced earlier this week that the encounter would be added to the list of televised matches with coverage being screened by Sky Sports from 7:45pm. The referee is Stuart Attwell.