West Ham United v Leeds United: YEP Jury give their big-match predictions

KEY MAN: Raphinha could be the key to unlocking the West Ham defence. Picture: Tony Johnson.

Our panel of fans look ahead to Leeds United’s trip to West Ham United at the London Stadium tomorrow.

DAVID WATKINS

None of the Jury believed Leeds would lose at home to West Ham… and yet we did, and that isn’t the only time this season we’ve managed that! This next game looks just as difficult to predict!

West Ham are the surprise of the season, they lost their opening two games at home to Newcastle and at Arsenal but since then have been remarkably consistent with only two defeats in their last 12 including seven wins.

DANGER MAN: West Ham United's Jesse Lingard. Picture: Kirsty Wigglesworth/PA Wire.

They are a big side, useful at set-pieces, and the driving force of Soucek in midfield has been a major factor.

As we go into the weekend, they sit sixth in the table, only two points behind Chelsea in fourth with a game in hand. With difficult games to come, they will no doubt see our visit as a good chance of points in their unlikely quest for a Champions League place.

In the reverse fixture, Leeds were poor but it was only two towering headers that did for us and we will need to be, literally and metaphorically, on our toes for this one.

Prediction: West Ham United 1 Leeds United 1.

PLENTY TO PONDER: Leeds United head coach Marcelo Bielsa. Picture: Naomi Baker/PA Wire.

MATTHEW EVANS

Tomorrow’s game against West Ham marks the start of a second year without football in our lives.

Clearly it exists in some form, otherwise there wouldn’t even be a game to talk about, but it’s not the same is it?

West Ham would have provided us with another new ground to visit, another new experience in the long-awaited Premier League return which has been robbed from us.

INFLUENCE: Leeds United's Pascal Struijk, right. Picture: Shaun Botterill/PA Wire.

Thankfully, it looks like we are here to stay for another year and results are going to mean less and less as we meander our way to the end of the season.

It’ll be like those many seasons in the Championship where dead rubber games were commonplace and all hope was lost.

In the Premier League, our mid-table averageness is more a welcome relief and provides Marcelo Bielsa with some freedom to experiment, tighten and tweak his Leeds machine for another crack at it in August when we will hopefully be back.

I think we’ll see the ‘London curse’ rear its head again tomorrow with a narrow defeat but it won’t matter too much and none of us will be there to see it.

SEASON TO SAVOUR: West Ham United head coach David Moyes. Picture: Martin Rickett/PA Wire.

Prediction: West Ham 2 Leeds United 1.

JACOB STARR

Ah yes, another trip to the capital which will undoubtedly result in yet another London loss, won’t it?