Matchday four in the 2023-24 Turkish Super Lig season will conclude with Hatayspor taking on Adana Demirspor at Mersin Stadyumu on Sunday evening.
The hosts are currently in fourth place in the league with five points after the first three matches, while the visitors are in 11th place, although they have played a game less than most of the sides above them.
Match preview
Hatayspor played out a stalemate away to Alanyaspor last weekend and maintained their unbeaten record this season following a draw against Kasimpasa and a 5-1 win over newly promoted Pendikspor on matchday one.
Notably, Volkan Demirel's side have looked good in defence this season, keeping clean sheets in their last two matches while they came within moments of a shoutout against Pendikspor before Thuram got a stoppage-time consolation for his side.
While they ended bottom of the league last term, the hosts were forced to withdraw from the league along with Gaziantep after an earthquake affected their stadium and several of the players and families.
However, they have resumed league duty promisingly this season and will be hoping to return to the type of form they managed in the 2020-21 campaign when they cracked the top six in the league table.
Meanwhile, Adana Demirspor will be looking to bounce back from the Conference League disappointment they suffered in midweek as they were beaten by Genk in the playoff round.
After losing the first leg 2-1, Patrick Kluivert's side levelled proceedings in the second leg with Cherif Ndiaye finding the target on the stroke of halftime, but they were unable to find the winner on their home patch and were eventually knocked out on penalties.
Still, that should not take away from what the Blue Lightnings have achieved over the past three seasons, which includes winning the TFF First League in 2020-21, finishing ninth in their first season back in the top flight and then securing a top-four finish last season.
With the European Cup competition out of the way, Adana Demirspor can now refocus on the domestic league and will fancy their chances here against an opponent that they beat last season and have not lost to in their last four meetings.
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Team News
Demirel switched up his side's formation from a 4-2-3-1 in the first two matches to a 4-3-3 with little effect in the last match, and it would come as no surprise if the Hatayspor boss reverted to the former for this encounter.
Fisayo Dele-Bashiru currently leads the goal-scoring charts for the hosts with two this season and will likely slip into a midfield trio with Carlos Strandberg and Armin Hodzic.
With a short turnaround time from their midweek Conference League qualifier, Kluivert may consider making a few changes to the side he put out against Genk, which could leave the door open for David Akintola to make the starting 11.
After scoring the opening goal against Ankaragucu, M'Baye Niang has had to come off the bench in the last two matches and will be hoping to play from the off in this one.
Hatayspor possible starting lineup:
Kardesler; Corekci, Kilama, Aksoy, Bekaroglu; Saglam, Aburjania; Hodzic, Dele-Bashiru, Strandberg; Yildirim
Adana Demirspor possible starting lineup:
Ozbir; Svensson, Gravillon, Guler, Rodrigues; Stambouli, Tokoz, Sari, Belhanda, Akintola; Ndiaye
We say: Hatayspor 1-1 Adana Demirspor
While the visitors are the favourites to win this match, we cannot count out the hosts just yet, as they have already shown their resilience in the last two weeks. In addition, the visitors might make a few changes to their side for this match, which could level the playing field significantly. We are going with a score draw in this one.
For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.
Top tip
Devesh Jaganath
