Citizens to hammer West Ham?
The Prem is finally back after a few agonising months and boy does it feel good. First up is West Ham against reigning champions Manchester City at the London Stadium.
West Ham
The hammer's preseason has been typical West Ham, very inconsistent in other words. 3 victories and 3 defeats is bang average and what makes it worse is that 2 of the defeats were to fellow Premier League outfits, a 4-1 dismemberment by City followed by a bleak 1-0 defeat to Newcastle.
Something i find highly positive however is that West Ham have finally overhauled their forward line. It has taken a while but the Hammer's have finally gotten rid of the injury-prone Andy Carroll, Arsenal reject Lucas Perez and the out of this world troublesome Marko Arnautovic. Highly coveted striker Sebastian Haller was brought in from Eintracht Frankfurt to replace them and it is looking like a very impressive purchase indeed. Another shrewd piece of business was acquiring attacking midfielder Pablo Fornals from Villarreal.
In Manuel Pellegrini West Ham also have a smart and experienced coach, add to the fact that they really do have a decent team and things are looking rather optimistic.
I do expect West Ham to fight for the Europa League slots farther down the line but playing against Manchester City on matchday 1 will be a tough uphill battle.
Manchester City
The Citizens have been lying low this summer with the only major acquisition being Rodri, the brick wall from Atletico Madrid brought in to be Fernandinho's long term replacement. Always nice to have different brick walls to choose from.
City have pretty much the same squad as last year and have not sold any major players, thus choosing to opt for stability which is definitely the smart path to take. A huge thorn in their backside is however Leroy Sane's recent long-term injury requiring surgery after opting against selling him to Bayern Munich, unlucky really.
Pep and co. have had a stellar preseason, they might not have played against top opposition but it is hard to whine when they get the job done. They also saw off Liverpool on penalties in the community shield a few days back which is probably one of the toughest thinkable games no-matter when in the season it is played.
All in all things are looking as good as can be bar Sane's injury and a trip to West Ham is not the most daunting of tasks so City fans have every right to be excited about the coming season.
Betting tip
City's odds of winning are unsurprisingly mega low which is why i will be backing a City win and over 2.5 goals at 33/50 with Bethard.
