Huddersfield Town welcome Stoke City to John Smith Stadium in Friday Night Football to kick off the latest round of Sky Bet Championship action.
Victory will lift Huddersfield up to fifth in the table whereas Stoke can climb to ninth with a win ahead of the weekend’s fixtures.
Team News
Duane Holmes is set to return for Huddersfield after completing self-isolation following a positive test for Coronavirus.
Levi Colwill remains absent with a knee injury.
Stoke have no fresh injury concerns after Tuesday’s defeat at Coventry as Ben Wilmot returns from a back injury.
Steven Fletcher (illness) and Sam Surridge (knee) are also set to be in contention.
Josef Bursik (quad), Romaine Sawyers (muscle), Jordan Thompson and Harry Souttar (both knee) remain absent.
Stat Attack
- Huddersfield have claimed just four points from their last five meetings against Stoke (W1, D1, L3).
- Stoke have avoided defeat in their last four visits to Huddersfield (W1, D3).
- Both teams have scored in each of their last four meetings with the Terriers netting seven goals to Stoke’s 12 goals.
- Carlos Corberan’s Terriers have scored first in five of their last six home league matches (W3, D2, L1).
- Three of Jacob Brown’s six league goals for Stoke this season have been scored away from home.
Prediction
Huddersfield come into this match unbeaten in their last nine matches in all competitions but Corberan will definitely expect a reaction here, following defensive shambles at Reading which was only saved by their clinical finishing which will be pleasing morale wise.
Stoke though need further improvement after winning just one of their last five league games and defeat at Coventry on Tuesday is another headache, having failed to put any of their seven shots onto target on top of being outplayed.
Michael O’Neill though should be confident of a result given the Potters’ form in this particular fixture but my gut instinct says that this could be scrappy, given the goalscoring form of both teams and defensive vulnerabilities but Huddersfield’s finishing might be the difference.
Prediction: Huddersfield 2-1 Stoke
Result: Huddersfield 1-1 Stoke
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