‘Nail in the coffin for Liverpool’: Paul Merson predicts how the Reds will turn up against West Ham

Liverpool will be looking for another Premier League win on Wednesday night when they travel to the London Stadium to take on West Ham United.

The Reds are still battling to secure European football next season after an inconsistent campaign currently sees them sat in seventh place.

Aware of how much is riding on these remaining fixtures, Paul Merson has predicted how Liverpool’s clash agains the Irons will play out.

Paul Merson makes Liverpool prediction

In his column for Sportskeeda, the Sky Sports pundit has stressed that Liverpool should be trying to win every match between now and the end of the season. Everything is riding on how Jurgen Klopp’s men perform in these final seven fixtures.

After factoring everything in, Merson believes it will be a 2-2 draw between Liverpool and West Ham. The reverse fixture at Anfield saw the Reds take all three points thanks to a lone goal from Darwin Núñez.

Liverpool recently went four games without a win, during a period that summed up their 2022/23 season as a whole. They managed to scrape draws against Arsenal and Chelsea, but lost 1-0 to Bournemouth and 4-1 to Manchester City.

During that run of games, they were also knocked out of the Champions League by Real Madrid on a 6-2 aggregate score.

However, since then, the Reds have dusted themselves off and are back on a winning streak, having claimed three points from Leeds and Nottingham Forest.

“The shackles are off for Liverpool at the moment and they’re looking good,” Merson wrote. “If you’re a professional footballer, the one thing you can bottle up is confidence. They’ve got that back now, and they’re looking dangerous.”

Indeed, Liverpool stormed to a dominant 6-1 win over Leeds away from home last week, with goals coming from Cody Gakpo, Mohamed Salah, Diogo Jota, and Núñez.

However, West Ham also have fire in their bellies. After beating Gent 5-2 on aggregate, David Moyes’ side are now into the semi-finals of the Europa Conference League.

“I think West Ham’s result yesterday will give them enough confidence to go on and win the Conference League,” Merson continued. “If you’re Liverpool, you do not want to be playing against West Ham now.

“Newcastle’s victory yesterday was the nail in the coffin for Liverpool’s Champions League hopes. They would’ve hoped for a draw in that match. This is going to be a great match, and I’m going to go with a Liverpool draw this week.”