Saturday sees Tottenham Hotspur visit the KC Stadium to face Steve Bruce’s Hull City.
Both teams come into the game off the back of disappointing midweek results. Hull City went down 1-0 away at relegation rivals Crystal Palace and the Tim Sherwood revolution was shown up quite badly as Tottenham lost 5-1 at home to league leaders Manchester City.
Hull go into the game with only 1 win in their last 6 games, and that was the surprising 6-0 victory at the KC Stadium over Fulham on December 28th 2013. Their last home win before that was an equally surprising 3-1 victory over Liverpool on December 1st 2013.
Tottenham on the other hand have been in excellent overall form under new manager Tim Sherwood, with 4 wins coming in their last 5 league games including a 2-1 win away at current champions Manchester United.
Interesting Facts
This will be the third meeting between the sides this season. Spurs won the league fixture 1-0 and following a 2-2 draw in the Capital One Cup, Spurs progressed on penalties.
Hull City have not scored in their last four league matches.
Tottenham have won their last five Barclays Premier League away matches.
This will be the first meeting between Steve Bruce and Tim Sherwood as managers.
Team News
Hull City will hope to have both new signings Shane Long and Nikica Jelavic available for the game. Goalkeeper Alan McGregor is suspended following his red card against Crystal Palace. On the injury front they are still without long term injury victims James Chester (Hamstring) Sone Aluko (Calf) and Joe Dudgeon (knee)
Tottenham will hope to have both Jan Vertonghen and Paulinho available after injury. They are still without Erik Lamela (Hip), Andros Townsend (Hamstring) and Younes Kaboul (thigh). Expect changes in midfield and defence following their 5-1 thrashing at the hands of Manchester City.
Key Men
Tom Huddlestone has been Hull City’s best performer this season. From his position in central midfield he has been able to dictate all Hull’s attacking play. When Huddlestone plays well, Hull play well. He has also broken his scoring duck this season and now sports a much shorter hairstyle due to that goal.
Huddlestone’s passing is one of his big strengths: he completes 90% of all passes in the defensive third, allowing Hull to build from the back. Once further forward he is then able to complete 64% of all attacking third passes.
Emmanuel Adebayor has been inspired since his return to first team action under Tim Sherwood. 5 Premier League goals in that period tells its own story. He has a 50% clear cut chance conversion rate and is scoring a goal every 129 minutes.
Match Prediction
Hull City are struggling for goals and points, especially at home. Spurs are on an incredible away run of form. I can only see that run continuing and fully expect them to return to London with all three points.
Expect Adebayor and Eriksen to both get on the score sheet as Spurs should run out comfortable 3-1 winners
