Norwich will travel north to Elland Road tomorrow evening for what will be their third league match in just eight days. Their opposition? Naturally it’s Leeds United, a side who’ve hit a terrible patch of form recently – amassing only a single point from their last four games and therefore looking likely to settle at around their current 15th position come the climax of the season in 4 games time. Conversely, the Canaries are soaring and will be looking to extend their unbeaten run to eight games and their win streak to five; a task that will undoubtedly hindered by the lack of midfield maestro Bradley Johnson who serves the second of his two game suspension.
The Yellow’s last outing against Bolton concluded with an emphatic strike from Gary Hooper to snipe all three points from the home side in what was, in its entirety, a relatively poor performance from us. Regardless, they all count and while Bolton are far from the most impressive side in this league, they still managed to hold on until the dying moments against a Johnson-less midfield which has the potential to prove an issue in this 7:45pm kick off too. We are at least in the fortunate position that we have not only universal depth in the squad, but with the middle of the park having some of the strongest and most accomplished of that depth at its disposal. Tettey will be pushed to his limits with two games in four days given the fragility of his knee, but it’s unlikely he’ll be rested entirely as surely one of the anchor-like duo will be a nigh on necessity. The most likely scenario is that Neil will employ the same five man midfield as he did against Bolton with Tettey and Dorrans holding down the two defensive midfield spots as part of our usual 4-2-3-1 formation, with Redmond, Howson and Hoolahan making up the three ahead of them from left to right. As you know by now though if you’ve read really any of my previous articles on this site, I’ll be rooting for an Odjidja-Ofoe feature and of course the 45 yard thunderbolt net-seeking shot that would unquestionably follow as he graced the filed with his ethereal presence.
Touching quickly on our injury list as is essential in the run up to any game, we’re still in excellent shape with no notable absentees across the senior squad. Saturday’s match also saw the reintroduction of amiable Elliott Bennett who is finally back to full fitness, alongside Lewis Grabban (who later came on) to the subs bench, the latter making a complete recovery a few weeks sooner than planned.
With that being some of the best squad selection news we could’ve hoped for, here’s the starting XI which I’d opt for ahead of tomorrow evening’s clash:
Preferred line up:
While I’m aware this is relatively unlikely to be the actual line up, I have justification for all the changes I’ve made. Whittaker once again highlighted himself to be broadly incompetent not just as a right back, but as a player in our last outing – consistently losing out to young Bolton winger, Walker. He managed to string together a few decent games a number of weeks ago, but that’s seemingly all he’s capable of; a few decent games. Martin’s a better RB than a centre back so I’d play him there instead and bring Ryan Bennett back into the fold. Aside from that, Hooper has to start after his last minute heroics and all round solid performance. Those are the only two alterations.
Verdict:
As always, I don’t like to read too much into how the game should pan out on paper. I believe we’ll win, we’re on form, they’re most certainly not and we have far more to play for. 2-0 Norwich.
Predict your own scoreline below, and get involved in the comment section!
[statsfc-score-predictor key=”n3hIsXGmdJ6AnSMKzUo6i09cnqzZIPNpYYb7QNmF” team=”Norwich”]`
