David Moyes admits that he may have no choice but to play a back five against Liverpool.
The Hammers were forced into multiple changes for last week’s 1-1 draw with Southampton after both Craig Dawson and Kurt Zouma were injured.
That resulted in the Irons fielding a formation with Ben Johnson, Thilo Kehrer, and Aaron Cresswell at centre-back; Vladimir Coufal played at right wing-back, with Emerson Palmieri on the opposite flank.
Both Dawson and Zouma are also likely to miss the Reds clash, and Moyes has admitted he may have to stick with the system that only saw them take a point at St Mary’s.
He told reporters: “I might have no choice. If you have no choice then you can’t decide on what will be best. We will just have to see what we have. We have played the majority of games in Europe with a back three, partly because it gets players games, not always tactically.
“But what we have with Nayef and Thilo, we have the ability to change to a back three. I have had to find a makeshift defence, and I didn’t think I had two central defenders against Southampton who could have played as a back two.”