West Ham's quest to reach a second successive European semi-final sees them entertain Gent after a 1-1 draw in Belgium last week.
The Hammers led the first leg of this quarter-final at half-time through a Danny Ings goal but were pegged back as Gent racked up 20 shots to their four. Nonetheless, David Moyes and his team will back themselves to get the job done in front of a passionate home crowd at the London Stadium – where they recovered from 2-0 down to draw 2-2 with Premier League leaders Arsenal on Sunday.
Gent are appearing in the last eight of a European competition for only the second time in their history. Hein Vanhaezebrouck's side have recorded only one away win in the Europa League this term – although that was a big one: 4-1 against Istanbul Basaksehir in the second leg of the last 16, with striker Gift Orban scoring a 205-second hat-trick, the quickest in UEFA competition history.
Kick-off is at 8pm BST.
Team news
West Ham have just the one confirmed injury absentee in striker Gianluca Scamacca.
As for Gent, they remain without injured midfielder Hjulsager, while centre-forward Darko Lemajic is a doubt.
Form
West Ham's draw with Arsenal earned them another crucial point in the battle to avoid relegation. After a bumpy start to 2023, the Hammers have won four and drawn three of their last seven games in all competitions.
Gent are arguably in even better nick, though: currently third in the Belgian top flight, the Buffalos are unbeaten in nine matches in league and cup – winning five of those – and have lost only one of their last 12.
Referee
Orel Grinfeld of Israel will be the referee for West Ham vs Gent.
Stadium
West Ham vs Gent will be played at the 66,000-capacity London Stadium in London.
In the US, kick-off time is 3pm ET / 12pm PT. The match will be shown onParamount+ in the US. See below for international broadcast options.
VPN guide
Use a VPN to watch Europa Conference League football from outside your country
If you’re out of the country for a Europa Conference League fixture, then you won't be able to watch on your domestic streaming service as usual. The broadcaster knows where you are because of your IP address (boo!) and blocks you from watching it. You can use a VPN to get around that, though, without resorting to illegal feeds you’ve found on Reddit.
A Virtual Private Network (VPN), assuming it complies with your broadcaster’s T&Cs, creates a private connection between your device and t'internet, meaning the service can’t work out where you are and will let you watch. And all the info going between is entirely encrypted, anonymous and safe – and that's a result.
There are plenty of good-value options out there.For the Europa League, FourFourTwo currently recommends:
ExpressVPN including a 30-day, money-back guarantee FourFourTwo’s brainy office mates TechRadar love its super speedy connections, trustworthy security and the fact it works with Android, Apple, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, PS5 and loads more. You also get a money-back guarantee, 24/7 support and it's currently available for a knockdown price. Go get it!
(Image credit: Future)
International Premier League TV rights
• UK: Sky Sports and BT Sport are the two main players once again, but Amazon also have a slice of the pie in 2022/23.
• USA: NBC Sports Group are the Premier League rights holders, with the Peacock Premium streaming platform showing even more than the 175 games it aired last season. If you pick up a fuboTV subscription for the games not on Peacock Premium, you'll be able to watch every game.
• Canada: The way to watch Premier League football in 2022/23 is fuboTV, which has exclusive rights to all the action.
• Australia: Optus Sport will screen every game of the Premier League season. Non-subscribers can access the action via a Fetch TV box and other friendly streaming devices.
• New Zealand: Sky Sport are serving up all 380 games – plus various highlights and magazine shows throughout the week, as well as the Champions League.
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Tom Hancock started freelancing for FourFourTwo in April 2019 and has also written for the Premier League and Opta Analyst, among others. He supports Wycombe Wanderers and has a soft spot for Wealdstone. A self-confessed statto, he has been known to watch football with a spreadsheet (or several) open...
