Today Sunderland will be travelling down to the MKM Stadium to take on Hull City. The clash will be the 47th meeting between the two clubs…
HULL CITY
Following Acun Ilicali’s takeover, Hull City have seen some solid investment over this last year. The Turkish revolution has seen the Tigers bring in players such as Ozan Tufan, Jean Michael Seri and Oscar Estupinan. Liam Rosenior has recently taken the reins at Hull, following Shota Arveladze’s sacking a few months back. The Tigers currency sit 21st in the league on 25 points, and they currently have the worst goal difference in the league. Hull have an average possession stat of 49.9% and Rosenier likes to play the 4-2-3-1 formation. Estupinan is their current top scorer, with the Colombian talisman bagging 8 goals so far this season. Oscar will be available for selection since he served his suspension last game.
As a whole I’d say that Hull are a side that can show up and beat anyone on their day, but their fragile backline holds them back.
SUNDERLAND
The Lads are coming off a 2-1 defeat against West Brom, and Tony Mowbray and co are looking to bounce back. Ross Stewart will be available for selection this weekend, so I wouldn’t be surprised if Mowbray gives him a run out. The Gaffer had this to say “Ross has fully trained and we’re hoping he can travel with us for the game, It’s definitely looking positive. I’m aware I said it last week and you’re of course wary of giving a certain ‘yes’, but he felt the stiffness after playing and scoring in the bounce game against Middlesbrough beforehand. He’s raring to go and wants to be involved as quickly as possible. All being well he’ll travel with us, and then we can take a look at potentially getting him involved.”
MY PREDICTION
My prediction for this game is a 1-0 win, Hull are finding some form but I still think our away record will pull us through. We need to pressure their fragile backline, the Tigers concede a lot of silly goals. I think Amad Diallo will cause them all kinds of problems, and the return of Ross Stewart adds to our frontline. Estupinan can be a problem, but you do have to spoon feed him chances for him to score, so if we keep it tight at the back we should be fine. Mowbray needs to make sure his game management is on point, and he needs to make the right substitutions at the right time.
MY PREDICTED SUNDERLAND 11 (FORMATION 4-2-2-2)
1 Anthony Patterson, 13 Luke O’Nien, 6 Danny Batth, 11 Lynden Gooch, 42 Aji Alese, 4 Corry Evans, 24 Dan Neil, 20 Jack Clarke, 16 Amad Diallo, 9 Ellis Simms, 14 Ross Stewart
MY PREDICTED HULL 11 (FORMATION 4-2-3-1)
1 Matt Ingram, 33 Cyrus Christie, 5 Alfie Jones, 17 Sean McLoughlin, 4 Jacob Greaves, 24 Jean Michael Seri, 15 Ryan Woods, 27 Regan Slater, 20 Dimitris Pelkas, 16 Ryan Longman, 19 Oscar Estupinan
