Sky Sports pundit Paul Merson has made a bold claim about West Ham United.
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West Ham are enjoying their best season for 35 years and are competing for the Champions League spots.
The Hammers are fourth in the Premier League table.
That is likely to change as West Ham’s rivals play twice again before David Moyes’s side entertain Leeds next Monday night.
West Ham flying high and in contention for European spots
But a win over the Yorkshire outfit should be enough to reclaim fourth spot.
West Ham put in another fine performance as they narrowly lost 2-1 to Man City on Saturday.
Michail Antonio was a threat and got the Hammers goal to make it 1-1 at half-time.
But West Ham’s solid defence was undone by a John Stones strike in the second half.
Now it will be all about how Moyes’s side respond over the remaining 12 games as to whether they get into Europe.
Merson makes very bold claim about Hammers star Michail Antonio
And they do so knowing they have one of the two most important players in the Premier League in the shape of seven-goal Antonio.
That’s the bold claim made by Sky Sports pundit Paul Merson, who says Antonio and Leicester’s Jamie Vardy are the two most important players in the Premier League.
“Antonio and Vardy are the best two outlet players in the Premier League,” Merson said on Sky Sports.
“For the way they (West Ham and Leicester) play, them two players are probably the most important players in the league because of the way they play and they give you such an outlet, they occupy defenders.
“You can’t just go drifting, you’ve got to be concentrating all the time with them two players. They make bad balls into good balls, they hold it up, they concentrate when they get the ball.
“He’s not got a lot of goals Antonio but he’s not a bad finisher.”
High praise but Antonio’s record speaks for itself
It is high praise indeed from Merson given some of the players in the top fight.
But the pundit is perhaps being a little harsh on Antonio’s goal record.
Since being converted from a winger to a striker by Moyes after lockdown last year, the West Ham star has scored 16 goals in 34 games.
Antonio is also closing in on breaking Paolo Di Canio’s record and becoming West Ham’s all-time leading Premier League goalscorer.
Anxious wait for Moyes this week
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