The gut says the DRAW

 

Southampton v West Ham
Premier League
4pm, SKY

NOTHING BUT NOTHING WILL TALK ME OUT OF THE DRAW

Do you know in punting when sometimes you just get a gut feeling about a match that virtually nothing will sway you away from your first instinct ?

Normally I examine stats, team news and current form in fine detail and it moves me one way or another – but with Southampton and West Ham this afternoon I can’t see anything other than a DRAW.

The head to stats for this match are:

Apr 2013 Premier Southampton 1-1 West Ham
Oct 2012 Premier West Ham 4-1 Southampton
Feb 2012 Championship West Ham 1-1 Southampton
Oct 2011 Championship Southampton 1-0 West Ham
Apr 2003 Premiership Southampton 1-1 West Ham
Dec 2002 Premiership West Ham 0-1 Southampton
Jan 2002 Premiership Southampton 2-0 West Ham
Oct 2001 Premiership West Ham 2-0 Southampton
May 2001 Premiership West Ham 3-0 Southampton
Nov 2000 Premiership Southampton 2-3 West Ham

The team news isn’t great for West Ham…

They will be without Andy Carroll after the England forward suffered a foot injury on his comeback from an Achilles problem. And further bad news that new signing Mladen Petric is not yet match fit, so Mali frontman Modibo Maiga is set to continue to lead the attack.

I’m not sure there’s going to be a lot of goals to look forward to either in what hardly looks a match worthy of a Super Sunday billing.

Anyway I don’t care what anyone says about this game. I’m leading with my gut. And playing the draw.

STAR FORECAST
(stake between 0.5 and 10 points)
7 points DRAW Southampton v West Ham