Fulham Match Preview

After failing to do the double over Aston Villa last month, West Ham United have the chance to achieve this feat when they travel to Craven Cottage to face newly-promoted Fulham this afternoon, looking for only their second away win of the season.

The Hammers haven’t had a top-flight encounter on the road since the disastrous 4-0 defeat at Brighton and Hove Albion on March 4 and following Wednesday night’s 5-1 home defeat by Newcastle United, they will be keen to bounce back here.

David Moyes’ side have only lost the away game at Nottingham Forest when coming up against the Premier League’s newcomers this season and they will hope that they can end the week just as they started it and bring another three points back to East London.

Despite the heavy defeat to the Magpies in midweek, the Irons remain in fifteenth place in the table and will hope that their record at Fulham down the years will bring them more success on this occasion.

This will be West Ham’s second trip to Craven Cottage of the campaign, as the two sides met back on 17 December for a mid-season friendly match which ended in a 1-1 draw.

The hosts haven’t played for a week and will want to make amends for their 2-1 defeat to fellow newly- promoted club AFC Bournemouth.

Moyes wasn’t giving anything away in his pre-match news conference on Friday but individual mistakes against Eddie Howe’s side may have had him thinking about a number of changes for this game. Alphonse Areola, Angelo Ogbonna, Aaron Cresswell, Vladimír Coufal, Manuel Lanzini, Maxwel Cornet, Flynn Downes, Pablo Fornals and Danny Ings are all in contention for starts.

Kurt Zouma will be hoping to retain his place after scoring in the midweek defeat, while Captain Declan Rice and Jarrod Bowen are also set to remain in the side.

The match kicks off at 3pm and the referee is Jarred Gillett.