This weekend Sunderland will host Luton Town at Stadium of Light. With the Lads looking to get back to winning ways, this could be an interesting affair.
LUTON TOWN
Rob Edwards has continued Nathan Jones’ great work at Luton, who are currently sitting fourth in the table. The former Watford man has been a hit at Kenilworth Road, especially with the Hatters now sitting six places above the Hornets.
Carlton Morris has continued his top form, since the last preview I did. The former Tyke has now secured 16 goals and five assists, so he is having the best season of his career. Luton have an average possession stat of just 46.2%, which is quite low. However, it shows they are very clinical. Edwards has continued to play 3-4-1-2, a system that has brought the Hatters success.
As a whole, I really like Luton’s recruitment model. They are working within their means, and finding hidden gems. Luton have continued to progress back up the football league over this last decade, and they could even get promoted to the Premier League. Honestly, they could replicate Brentford and Brighton. Kenilworth Road in the Premier League would be a sight to see.
SUNDERLAND
It has been a mixed week so far for Sunderland, a surprising 1-0 win away at Norwich was followed up by a 2-1 home defeat to Sheffield United. It seems that we have found a new way of playing, we now sit back and try to catch teams on the counter. Not to mention, we are also starting to frustrate teams. Maybe this is solely down to the quality of opposition in front of us, but we needed to change things up, so I am not complaining.
MY PREDICTION
I am going for another 2-1 defeat, Only Burnley have picked up more points on the road than Luton Town this season. It could be a close game, but Luton are on red hot form right now. I think Carlton Morris and Elijah Adebayo will be a handful for our defenders, and their link up play will be hard to deal with. There aren’t many strike partnerships in the Championship at the moment. I think they will both get on the score sheet. Jack Clarke will score for us. Hopefully, I’m wrong and we can get the three points.
MY PREDICTED SUNDERLAND 11 (FORMATION 4-2-3-1)
1 Anthony Patterson, 32 Trai Hume, 5 Dan Ballard, 6 Danny Batth, 13 Luke O’Nien, 25 Edouard Michut, 24 Dan Neil, 21 Alex Pritchard, 10 Patrick Roberts, 20 Jack Clarke, 28 Joe Gelhardt
MY PREDICTED LUTON 11 (FORMATION 3-4-1-2)
34 Ethan Horvath, 32 Gabriel Osho, 4 Tom Lockyer, 29 Amari Bell, 45 Alfie Doughty, 8 Luke Berry, 13 Marvelous Nakamba, 2 Cody Drameh, 22 Allan Campbell, 11 Elijah Adebayo, 9 Carlton Morris
