West Ham v Eintracht Frankfurt predictions: Expect a lively first leg in London

Free football tips, best bets and analysis for West Ham v Eintracht Frankfurt in Thursday's Europa League semi-final first leg.

Where to watch

BT Sport 1, 8pm Thursday

Best bets

Both teams to score
3pts 4-5 Hills

Martin Hinteregger to be first goalscorer
0.5pt each-way 35-1 Paddy Power

Team news

West Ham
The Hammers are missing injured centre-backs Kurt Zouma, Angelo Ogbonna and Issa Diop but Aaron Cresswell returns from a European ban.

Eintracht Frankfurt
Kristijan Jakic and Obite Evan Ndicka are suspended and Diant Ramaj is injured. Djibril Sow should be fit enough to return to the centre of midfield.

Match preview

West Ham swaggered into the Europa League semi-finals thanks to a 3-0 second-leg victory in Lyon but the Hammers should expect a testing first-leg contest against Eintracht Frankfurt at the London Stadium.

Frankfurt, like their hosts, have been in patchy domestic form and arrive in east London on a run of just one win in nine in all competitions.

That lone victory was one to savour, however: a 3-2 success at Camp Nou which sealed a 4-3 aggregate quarter-finals win over Europa League favourites Barcelona.

And Frankfurt's progress was more straightforward than that scoreline suggests as they took the lead on the night, and in the tie, with a fourth-minute penalty from Filip Kostic.

Oliver Glasner's men went 3-0 up midway through the second half and only started to wobble during a lengthy period of injury time in which Barcelona scored twice and Frankfurt defender Evan Ndicka was sent off.

An estimated 30,000 travelling supporters from Germany made it into Camp Nou and Barca coach Xavi admitted the hostile atmosphere at their own home ground "logically could have affected us".

West Ham will be hoping to make the most of their home advantage in the first leg although Frankfurt's away record in the Europa League this season suggests the best bet may be to back both teams to score.

The Bundesliga outfit won on their last visit to London, beating Arsenal 2-1 in the group stage of this competition in November 2019, and they have relished this term's European trips.

The Group D winners triumphed 1-0 at Antwerp, 2-1 at Olympiakos – traditionally hard to beat on their own patch – and drew 1-1 at Fenerbahce before claiming an impressive 2-1 first-leg win at Real Betis, who were going strong in La Liga at the time, in the last 16.

West Ham's defensive injuries provide another reason to back goals at both ends as David Moyes is missing centre-backs Kurt Zouma, Angelo Ogbonna and Issa Diop.

That leaves the Hammers with a probable back three of Ben Johnson, Craig Dawson and Aaron Cresswell, who performed well against Chelsea at the weekend until Dawson was sent off in the 86th minute and Christian Pulisic nabbed the only goal of the game three minutes later.

That sealed a fourth Premier League defeat in seven matches for West Ham, whose early-season hopes of crashing the top four are long gone.

They have some great attacking talent, as they showed in Lyon, but have kept just one clean sheet in ten league games and their defensive absences could leave them exposed at set-piece situations.

Frankfurt's Austrian centre-back Martin Hinteregger is worth a small each-way bet to open the scoring. His only goal this term came in October's Bundesliga win at Bayern Munich but he scored ten times in 59 starts across the 2019-20 and 2020-21 campaigns and poses a threat to a reshuffled home rearguard.

Key stat

Both teams have scored in nine of Eintracht Frankfurt's ten Europa League matches this season.

Inside info

Eintracht Frankfurt

Penalty taker Goncalo Paciencia/Filip Kostic
Free-kick wizard Filip Kostic
Set-piece aerial threat Martin Hinteregger
Card magnet Djibril Sow

West Ham

Penalty taker Manuel Lanzini/Mark Noble
Free-kick wizard Aaron Cresswell
Set-piece aerial threat Craig Dawson
Card magnet Declan Rice

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