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Premier League statistical preview, including Tottenham vs Arsenal; Everton vs Liverpool; West Ham vs Manchester United
WhoScored.com, who offer the largest online database for detailed football statistics, preview the top matches the Premier League this weekend
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Your support makes all the difference.Kicking off the weekend's Premier League action in style, Tottenham host North London rivals Arsenal in Saturday's first fixture. With only two points and one place separating the sides there will be more than just local pride at stake when they meet at White Hart Lane. Both sides have reason to be optimistic, coming into the game off the back of handsome victories last weekend, and will be hoping their star turns can do the business once again this Saturday.
Spurs' saviours are becoming abundantly clear, with the ever-improving Harry Kane tending to get the ball rolling for Mauricio Pochettino's men before Christian Eriksen secures the three points right at the death. Interestingly, however, both have been more prolific on the road this season, with 13 of a combined 19 league strikes from Tottenham's talismen coming away from home.
Luckily for the hosts Arsenal will be without top scorer Alexis Sanchez once again, though the Chilean has netted just 4 of his 12 league strikes on foreign territory. The return to both fitness and form of Ozil and Walcott is a timely boost for the visitors though, with the latter scoring 4 and assisting 3 goals in his last 6 league appearances against Spurs, the last of which - this time last year - saw him sustain the knee injury that had kept Walcott sidelined to now.
Speaking of timely returns (or highly untimely returns for those of the blue persuasion on Merseyside), Daniel Sturridge took just 12 minutes to score on his return to league action for Liverpool last weekend. The fact, then, that the England striker has not scored more competitive goals against any other club than he has against Everton (6), including 3 facing the Toffees last season, will leave the Reds rightly optimistic.
Brendan Rodgers will have been relieved having narrowly avoided the prospect of extra time against Bolton in the cup in midweek, with Liverpool now unbeaten after 90 minutes in their last 13 matches in all competitions. A lot of the focus in this particular Merseyside derby will revolve around Steven Gerrard, as it will be his last. The Liverpool captain has only scored more goals against Villa in his career than the Toffees (10) but his last goal at Goodison came way back in 2005.
The hosts will hope to spoil Gerrard's day of course, and picked up an important victory ahead of Saturday's game last time out following a dismal run of results. Roberto Martinez's side have had a tough second season under the Spaniard and, having lost just 3 matches at this stage last season, have already tasted league defeat more times in the current campaign (9) than they had at the 2013/14 season's close (8).
This weekend's action culminates at Upton Park with West Ham hosting Manchester United, hoping to close a gap to the Red Devils that has developed after a tough run of fixtures. Not long ago the Hammers were dreaming of Champions League football but with just 1 league win in 6 their aspirations have certainly been dashed. Still not out of the running for a Europa League push, however, Sam Allardyce's men will want to protect an impressive home record.
Indeed, only three sides have picked up more points as hosts than the Hammers going into the weekend (23), conceding just 10 goals and keeping 5 clean sheets at the Boleyn Ground. The fact that United have won just 3 league matches on the road this season and scored a modest 13 goals away from home will give the home fans reason for optimism then, though the unavoidable truth that the Londoners have picked up just 1 point from a possible 36 in their last 12 meetings with the Manchester club will probably overrule any great hopes in this one.
With 10 goals in his last 9 league meetings with West Ham Wayne Rooney will hope to end a drought of 7 competitive matches without scoring. Meanwhile Robin van Persie, who took his league tally to 9 for the season against Leicester last weekend, has struck in each of his last 6 league meetings with the Hammers, so the hopes of a sixth clean sheet at home for the hosts seem remote.
All statistics courtesy of WhoScored.com, where you can find yet more stats, including live in-game data and unique player and team ratings. You can follow all the scores, statistics, live player and team ratings with the new free-to-download WhoScored iOS app
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