Sports Mole previews Saturday's Championship clash between Sheffield Wednesday and Coventry City, including predictions, team news and possible lineups.

Bottom-of-the-league Sheffield Wednesday host newly-promoted Coventry City on Saturday as Tony Pulis desperately seeks to end his side's dire run of form.

Coventry, meanwhile, were amongst the relegation favourites prior to the start of the season but have battled their way to 18th, six points clear of the drop and are in good form ahead of this encounter.

Match preview

Sheffield Wednesday manager Tony Pulis pictured in November 2020 © Reuters

Wednesday come into this contest in a desperate situation, sitting bottom of the Championship with just nine points after 19 games following their six-point deduction at the start of the season.

Furthermore, they are on a nine-game winless run in the league and have lost their last four in a row, slipping further and further from safety.

Two of the club's most serious on-field issues have been their goalscoring statistics and their disciplinary record.

Wednesday have scored just 10 goals in 19 games this term - the joint-worst in the league along with Derby County - and the Owls have had five players sent off in that time, at least two more than any other side.

Coventry will certainly hope to take advantage of Wednesday's struggles and maintain their own good recent form.

Having endured a difficult start to the season in which they lost seven of their opening 11 league games, the newly-promoted outfit have gone eight games unbeaten.

While five of those eight games were draws, it is a remarkable improvement from a side that looked certain to drop straight back down into League One.

Coventry have tightened up defensively in recent weeks, conceding just four times in their unbeaten run and keeping four clean sheets, a tally that manager Mark Robins will expect to be boosted against a profligate Wednesday outfit.

Sheffield Wednesday Championship form: DDLLLL

Coventry City Championship form: DDWDWD

Team News

Coventry City manager Mark Robins pictured in October 2020 © Reuters

Wednesday boss Pulis has a number of senior players absent due to injury ahead of Coventry's trip to Sheffield.

Julian Borner, Keiren Westwood, Jack Marriott and Aden Flint are all expected to be out until later this month.

Dominic Iorfa, however, has been ruled out for the rest of the season with an Achilles tendon injury.

Coventry head coach Robins also has several players unavailable for this contest.

Liam Kelly, Marko Marosi and Matt Godden are sidelined in the short-term, while Jodi Jones will miss the rest of the campaign with an ACL injury.

Sheffield Wednesday possible starting lineup:
Wildsmith; Odubajo, Lees, Dunkley, Van Aken, Reach; Harris, Pelupessy, Shaw, Bannan; Windass

Coventry City possible starting lineup:
Wilson; Ostigard, McFadzean, Hyam; Dabo, Hamer, Sheaf, McCallum; O'Hare, Allen; Walker

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We say: Sheffield Wednesday 0-1 Coventry City

Wednesday's poor form and struggles in front of goal should see a Coventry side unbeaten in eight and boasting a strong recent defensive record come away with all three points - and possibly a clean sheet - on Saturday.

Top betting tip

Our expert tipster partners at Sporita.com are predicting over 1.5 goals in this match. Click here to find out what else they are predicting for this game and for more of their tried-and-tested football tips.

Data Analysis

Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Coventry City win with a probability of 37.15%. A win for Sheffield Wednesday had a probability of 32.62% and a draw had a probability of 30.2%.

The most likely scoreline for a Coventry City win was 0-1 with a probability of 13.65%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 0-2 (7.35%) and 1-2 (7.26%). The likeliest Sheffield Wednesday win was 1-0 (12.54%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (13.49%). The actual scoreline of 1-0 was predicted with a 12.5% likelihood.