Premier League preview: West Ham v Sunderland

Relegated and managerless West Ham will exit the Premier League on Sunday as losers, if Jordan Henderson has his wish.

The Sunderland midfielder, who scored the only goal of the game when the sides met in December on Wearside, wants to add to the Hammers’ agony.

The Londoners threw away a two-goal lead at relegation rivals Wigan to lose 3-2 on Sunday, which consigned them to the Championship next season.

That leaves them with nothing to play for except pride in the season finale against the Black Cats at Upton Park on Sunday.

In contrast, Sunderland head to London knowing that a win would give them a faint hope of scraping into the top 10.

“It’ll be a big game for us with it being the last game of the season,” Henderson, who turns 21 on June 17, told the Sunderland Echo.

“Hopefully we can go there and do a job.”

“It doesn’t matter what’s happened to them. It would have been difficult if they had something to play for or not.”

“Hopefully, we can get the right result. We just need to concentrate on the game itself. There are three points to play for, we can’t worry about where we finish.”

“We’ve just got to go there, put up a fight and get a good result.”

The Hammers, meanwhile, will have first-team coach Kevin Keen in charge against Sunderland.

Despite their dismal end to the season, Hammers’ fans can take heart from some interesting statistics before bowing out of the Premier League.

West Ham have won their last six meetings with the Black Cats at Upton Park, keeping five clean sheets along the way.

They have also won 14 of their last 19 Premier League home games against teams from the north east.

Should the Hammers win this match, they will have collected more points (36) than any other team to have finished bottom of the table in any 20-team Premier League season.

The Hammers have gone eight games without a win, but they are unbeaten in their last seven Premier League final day fixtures.

And keep a close eye on in-form striker Demba Ba. Since the close of the January transfer window, only six players have scored more goals than the Senegalese international.