2022-23 Sky Bet Championship: Week 25 – Friday

Norwich City welcome Reading to Carrow Road in a huge Sky Bet Championship clash in the play-off race.

Victory could see Norwich climb as high as fourth if Watford lose elsewhere, whilst Reading can leapfrog their hosts with a win and go fourth themselves if results elsewhere swing in their favour.

 

Team News

Norwich have no fresh injury concerns to report following Monday’s 2-1 defeat at Luton, as Aaron Ramsey (knee), Todd Cantwell (groin), Jacob Sorensen (foot) and Jonathan Rowe (shin) remain ruled out.

Reading again could be without Scott Dann (hamstring) as he looks to make his first appearance of the season, after he failed to make the matchday squad for Tuesday’s win against Swansea.

Sam Hutchinson (calf), Dejan Tetek (hamstring), Ovie Ejaria (knock), Tyrese Fornah and Liam Moore (both knee) remain absent.

 

Stat Attack

• Norwich have dropped just four points out of a possible 24 points from their last eight meetings against Reading (W6, D2).
• Reading have won just one of their last seven visits to Norwich (W1, D1, L5).
• Both teams have scored in 14 of their last 15 meetings – with the only exception being a 0-0 draw at Reading’s Madejski Stadium in November 2012.
• Norwich have kept just one clean sheet in their last eight home matches (W2, D2, L4) – against QPR in November 2022, during which they conceded 12 goals across seven of those eight fixtures.
• Five of Tom Ince’s six goals for Reading this season have been scored after half-time.

 

Prediction

Despite suffering three losses in their last four matches, Norwich are still right in the play-off mix but this is a huge rebound opportunity following Dean Smith’s departure, which they really have to take if they’re to get their season back on form although automatic promotion looks very difficult now.

Reading meanwhile clinically executed their chances to snatch a deserved win over Swansea in a game where they also defended well, even despite Swansea’s habit of attempting a comeback so confidence will be high coming into a fixture where they have traditionally struggled form-wise.

The Royals’ form is also the exact opposite of Norwich so this could be an interesting clash but if the Canaries can regroup and show their best quality with a positive bounce of losing Smith, I wouldn’t be surprised if Norwich can snatch the win.

Prediction: Norwich 2-1 Reading

Result: Norwich 1-1 Reading