Sunderland welcome Plymouth Argyle to the Stadium of Light in the Championship. Last time out in the league Sunderland drew at Middlesbrough and Plymouth won at Swansea. On Tuesday a much-changed team lost 4-1 at home to Leeds in the FA Cup The Black Cats moved up to 8th place with the 1-1 draw at Boro but remain 2 points behind 6th placed Hull City. Michael Beale made one change giving new signing Leo Hjelde a debut in place of Jenson Seelt at Boro, Romaine Mundle was named on the bench with Patrick Roberts and Caden Kelly. Dan Ballard should be available, Alese, Embleton and Styles are back in training but Cirkin, Dack, Huggins and Evans remain on the injured list. Plymouth Argyle claimed a long-awaited first away victory of the season as Morgan Whittaker struck the only goal against former club Swansea City on Saturday. Whittaker scored his 17th goal of the season with a precise first-half finish and Plymouth held on. The Pilgrims are 15th in the league 8 points behind Sunderland. Bali Mumba makes a return to the SoL and is expected to start. Mick Beale: "I thought first half we were really good in terms of our attacking play, and again we've missed a big opportunity in an away game and you're wondering if that's going to hurt you. "In the first half we got into some really interesting areas without executing. I was pleased with the first half, both teams went for each other. "We didn't start the second half well, we conceded off the second phase of a set-play, and we can't keep conceding goals from set-plays. "Our reaction to that was really good, we score and in the last 10 minutes I felt we ought to get a winner. Balls are flashing across goal and we're not there to get the last touch. I think it's a big point." Ian Foster: (After Swansea) "In my short time at the club, we have had to find a way of winning on the road. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices in order to do that. "Our challenge is to maintain the attacking threat we have but from a really solid defensive structure. "That was probably a perfect performance today in terms of doing that. "Of course at times we have to get better with the ball, but we have to start somewhere. We have to get the points on the board." Match Appointments: Referee: ANTHONY BACKHOUSE Assistant Referees: Sam Lewis & Alex James Fourth Official: Will Finnie Team Lineups: Sunderland AFC: (4-3-3) Patterson, Hume, O’Nien, Ballard, Hjelde, Neil, Ekwah, Jobe, Clarke, Ba, Rusyn. Subs: Bishop, Pembele, Seelt, Mundle, Aouchiche, Burstow, Rigg, Roberts, Hemir Injured: Evans, Cirkin, Huggins, Dack, Alese Plymouth (3-4-2-1) Hazard, Phillips, Gibson, Galloway, Mumba, Gyabi, Forshaw, Miller, Whittaker, Devine, Hardie Subs: Sousa, Pleguezuelo, Wright, Randell, Waine, Burton, Sorinola, Roberts, Issaka Injured: None Betting Odds: Sunderland 1/2 Plymouth 5/1 Draw 7/2 Prutton Predicts: meh My two pence: A good result at the Riverside but we need to build on that with our next 3 games. Plymouth got their first away win last week and a much changed side took a thrashing off Leeds in the FA cup. However they do have the league’s top scorer in Whittaker so we need to be solid in defence and hope that they make a few mistakes at the back. I’m going for a 3-1 home win Live Stream: Available to overseas fans https://safc.com/news/team-news/live-video Press conference: Ha’way the Lads
Hjelde has a big task on his hands with Whittaker, keep him quiet and we win the game. 3-1 Clarke, Rusyn x2
Plymouth don't travel well, had a draining match on Tuesday and have conceded more than QPR ... ... we seem to be tightening up, at the back, so I think we'll win 1-0. If we win Beale will start to look like he could actually succeed here, that would be 7 points from 9, not bad. Ha'way the Lads!!!
Fancy us to win this one, your team is spot on RTB and what I think Beale will pick too. If he picks Burstow over Rusyn I'll have to do some soul searching to try and make sense of life but I don't think he will.
Another vital game for both sides. I’d be disappointed with anything less than 3 points. Ha’way the lads!
Miss this one unfortunately. Away with work. Maybe able to catch the second half on my phone. We should be going all out for the 3 points. They had a rough midweek game and need to travel north. Rusyn to start please.
Mixed bag of results against these, they generally don't travel well and we've got to start on the front foot. Get the fans up and behind us early doors and we could have too much for these, however they're a tidy unit who like to play football so that might help us as well. HTL.
5/1 for Plymouth is decent given the Jekyll and Hyde nature of our performances. We never know what we're going to get.
Realistically they won't go up or down so I'm hoping the edge has left them slightly. It's a much more important game, for us, and the team all seem to be pulling together as we saw at Boro, they don't give up easily. Plymouth are a bit of a strange outfit but try to play football and don't seem to be a timewasting shytehousing bunch. They don't like possession, away from home, and only had 29% in their 1-0 win at Swansea so we'll have to be patient and clever. Swansea had 20 shots so it's obvious that's not a great tactic. I'd love to see us score another exciting goal but I'm really expecting a 1-0 win with a Ballard header from a corner.
No press conference as promised Men's Team: Plymouth Argyle await the Lads this coming weekend, following another uninterrupted week on the training ground for Michael Beale and his squad. Catch snapshots from training over on our X account. Michael Beale will discuss the upcoming fixture with the press at 1.30 pm on Thursday.
