Sunderland travel to Huddersfield in the Championship. Last time out Sunderland drew at Luton and Huddersfield beat Millwall. The Black Cats came back from a goal down to secure a valuable point at Kenilworth Road with Leon Dajaku and Bailey Wright returning to the side, Elliot Embleton came off the bench to grab the equaliser. Ellis Simms could return to the starting eleven after recovering from his toe injury, he played the last 20 minutes against Luton. Patrick Roberts will also be in contention to start against Huddersfield but star man Jack Clarke is suspended for one game after picking up his 5th yellow card of the season. Huddersfield briefly climbed off the foot of the Championship after an impressive win over Millwall on Saturday. Town's first win in four came off the back of a much-improved display by Mark Fotheringham's side. The only goal came from a speculative long-range strike from Yuta Nakayama inside the opening 10 minutes. Play maker Sorba Thomas is unavailable due to suspension. Connor Mahoney or Aaron Rowe could replace him in the starting 11. Jordan Rhodes is also in contention to start up front. Tony Mowbray: "It was a fine balance today between having enough physicality on the pitch, but then as the game went on and we needed a goal, we had to put more footballers on the pitch. The only way to beat them, really, is to put your footballers on the pitch and keep the ball off them and move it through their lines. "But if you start like that, you could be 3-0 down after 20 minutes because you can't win a header and you can't defend, and people will say 'what are you doing?' We had to build what we wanted to play into our game as we went along. "Every team we play we watch them, we see their strengths, their weaknesses, and this is a team that drops a lot of diagonals in your box, they are very direct. They try to work it up and then they'll drop it in from high up the pitch, if you allow them. They put a lot of diagonals in your box, so you need both your centre-halves to be strong to deal with them whether they are coming in from the left or the right. "It was a pretty obvious decision [to play Wright] on the day. We had to get it tactically right and in the first 15 minutes we struggled a bit, the ball was bouncing around our six-yard box and we didn't deal with it well enough. Mark Fotheringham: “I’m really proud of the lads. They’ve worked so hard all week and today and they’ve given our fans a performance to be proud of.” “We have to build from clean sheets, and that’s three in my period here now. I thought the back four was really solid, and our young lads - the likes of Etienne Camara and Ben Jackson - really stood up to be counted.” “We’ve never lost our confidence at any point. You don’t score three at Luton, beat Hull, or get a point at Middlesbrough unless you’re a good team. I’ve kept reinforcing that with the players.” “The players have to enjoy tomorrow with their families now, because the hard work starts again for the Sunderland game. I think it’s very hard to play through us now. The distances between the players are better & we’re dealing better with first & second balls.” Match Appointments: Referee: OLIVER LANGFORD Assistant Referees: Sam Lewis and Akil Howson Fourth Official: Darren Bond Team Lineups: Sunderland AFC: (4-3-3) Patterson, Cirkin, Batth, Wright, O’Nien, Evans, Embleton, Diallo, Bennette, Roberts, Simms Subs: Bass, Hume, Matete, Michut, BA, Neil, Dajaku Injured: Huggins, Ballard, Stewart, Alese Suspended: Clarke Huddersfield Town: (4:3:3) Nicholls, Turton, Lee(c), Helik, Nakayama; Kasumu, Rudoni, Camara; Holmes, Rhodes, Jackson. Subs: Bilokapic, Russell, Rowe, Mahoney, Boyle, Ruffels, Diarra Injured: Pearson, Hogg, Anjorin, Jones, Simpson Suspended: Holmes Betting Odds: Sunderland 17/10 Huddersfield 13/8 Draw 9/4 Prutton Predicts: 1-1 My two pence: Huddersfield beat Millwall with a bit of a flukey goal but they did make it into the play-offs last season and have a lot of quality players who can be very dangerous on the break. Hopefully one of our youngsters makes the most of the opportunity to replace Jack Clarke. I’d put Bennette out on the left to see what he can do. Oliver Langford was in charge of our game at Stoke and he booked 6 of our players and 3 of theirs, we could have a few more suspensions to deal with after this game. I’m going for a 2-1 away win Live Stream: https://www.safc.com/news/team-news/live-video SAFSee streaming will only be available to overseas-based supporters. Audio commentary will be available to all supporters. The game will be shown live via the red button on Sky Sports Football Ha’way the Lads
Agree. Think Embo is a better option alongside Evans at the moment. Love DN, but he is still young and needs a short spell out the team
This is my first away game since we played Liverpool and Kenwyne Jones missed a sitter and we lost 2-0!!! it’ll be my 18 year old son’s first ever away game. Thanks to @Smug in Boots for sorting me the tickets. Very excited
From the Huddersfield forum ... ... "We should be beating the likes of Sunderland. " This is a team one point off bottom, more defeats than anyone else and who just lost at home to Preston without managing a single attempt on goal ... ... if we said that they'd be calling us self entitled.
The Liverpool fans to our right looked genuinely shocked at the noise we made .... ... especially when we were mocking then for looking like a mural.
RTB We need to shore up our defence (it would help if referees were more on the ball) aiming for clean sheet. Defend from the front as they say. It seems that Simms is on the way back, thank God, a target man is critical. Our player of the season (IMHO) Clarke is missing for this game. A post above indicates that Huddersfield think we are a soft touch... there's the pre-match team talk! A win would be massive!
Thanks again RTB your team looks fine to me and I am expecting a much needed win here , not sure about our mid-field pairing but content to leave it to TM to get it right, and I also think mid-field will be our strength second half of the season all being well OaU
Thanks RTB another well presented match thread as usual, enjoyed your team pick and im well behind that, i've gone for the win,and as far as the score goes well any win will do at the moment, pleased Simms is back, i envisage more goals because of it.
Their first choice RB is out. Hopefully he is replaced with a young lad who it tortured by roberts/bennette etc.
Huddersfield struggle to score goals and we struggle to keep a clean sheet, this this is nailed on for 0-0 However we score at least one most games and I'd be delighted to win this 1-0 TM has already indicated that Simms won't start so we need to get to an hour still in the game then go on and win it. Simples.HTL
Thanks RTB, dont think Simms will start after what TM has said. I would shake it up in midfield and drop Dan Neil, lets see what Michut can do from the start. Put Roberts back in with Clarke being banned. 1-1 for me...
Great thread RTB Gonna have to trust TM on team selection as I have no idea of the team I would put out I think we will win 2-0 Hawaaaaay
Wow, still can't believe we have all these players ... ... win or lose we're always capable of playing some good football. I've enjoyed our Kevin Ball, Cattermole, type of eras but this is something I've not seen in fifty years ... ... I think it's incredibly brave of KLD to have started this in L1 and continued as a newly promoted team in a tough league. Anyone can be a Luton, slinging in endless short/medium/long diagonals and playing 6'4" strikers. Balls to that ...