The return of the Premier League from the World Cup break continues on Tuesday evening with two more matches as four teams get back up and running for their campaign and begin their festive periods.
Two of those four teams will have their eye on the top part of the table while the other two will be focusing on staying afloat this term. Both matches are live on Amazon Prime and they follow each other so we don’t need multiple devices to watch them.
Chelsea vs AFC Bournemouth (17.30 – Prime Video)
The opening match of the evening comes from Stamford Bridge where Chelsea will look to revive their top four hopes when they play host to an AFC Bournemouth side for whom the immediate challenge is to pull away from the bottom three.
The World Cup break came at a very good time for Chelsea who had lost their last three in the Premier League and were five without a win in the league. Such a run has seen them drop down to ninth in the table so they need to hit the ground running upon this resumption. Bournemouth picked up a win to go into the break with and have appointed Gary O’Neill as permanent boss since then. This is his first league game as the full boss and maybe has a free hit given the stature of Chelsea. We probably know how Bournemouth will play but there is lot more guessing involved with Chelsea who picked up a lot of injuries in the World Cup break and who have players coming back late from the World Cup and everything else. These are two teams I would like to reassess before I get stuck into their matches so I’ll give this one a swerve.
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Manchester United vs Nottingham Forest (20.00 – Prime Video)
The second match of the night comes from Old Trafford where Manchester United will go in search of a win which will see them close right in on the top four when they host a Nottingham Forest who looked out of their depth before the break and will hope to show they are better than that here.
Manchester United had an up and down beginning to the season under Erik ten Hag but you would imagine that now he has finally sorted out the elephant in the room saga with him and Cristiano Ronaldo that this side will go from strength to strength. Nottingham Forest started the season terribly but the longer it went on the better they got. That is no surprise given the insane amount of players who came through the door in the summer. Steve Cooper has had six weeks to work with most of his squad with them just having five players at the World Cup, three of whom played for Wales who were home almost before it began. He is a very good coach so we should expect an improved Nottingham Forest in the second part of the season but each time they have come up against a top side they have looked well short of the mark and I suspect that will be the case here. They have been to the top three and lost 2-0 at Newcastle, 6-0 at Man City and 5-0 at Arsenal while Tottenham in fourth went to the City Ground and won 2-0. Forest might find it easier to get at a United defence which is missing Lisandro Martinez and has Raphael Varane probably needing to be managed back given his World Cup exploits. Where they are not helped is their keeper, Dean Henderson, is on loan from Man Utd so he can’t play in this match. That means Wayne Hennessey will play and the last time we saw him in action he was trying to decapitate an Iran player at the World Cup. I really expect the Red Devils to kick on under ten Hag, especially going forward, and I think the home side will have far too much in a game where Forest might find the net but are primed to concede plenty more than they score.
Tips
Back Manchester United (-1) to beat Nottingham Forest for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with Coral
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