Stoke vs Sunderland prediction: ENGLAND: Championship betting tips on match 2022-08-19 14:00.
Stoke City secured their fourth point of the season on Wednesday when they scored a stoppage-time equaliser to draw 2-2 with Middlesbrough. There was plenty of discontent from the home contingent at the bet365 Stadium, as Stoke were dominated for large periods, but manager Michael O’Neill was positive at full-time, insisting his side deserved their point because they “stuck at it”.
The Stoke boss will hope they can use that result as a platform to kick on here, especially as they’re proving to be a tough nut to crack for opponents on their home turf. Stoke have now lost just one of their last seven home league games (W4, D2), restricting their opponents to a goal or less in all but one of those matches. That’s an interesting trend when you consider they’ve also never been breached more than once in each of the last six games against Sunderland on home turf (W2, D3, L1).
Sunderland’s unbeaten start (W1, D2) to the season came to an end on Wednesday when they went down 2-1 to Sheffield United. However, that didn’t stop manager Alex Neil from hailing his players as 'brilliant' post-match as they fought hard for an hour with only ten men, but it wasn’t enough to avoid conceding two or more goals in a fourth straight away game in this division.
The side from the north-east do look to have the firepower to counter that leaky defence though and will come into this round having scored the joint-most league goals in the division so far (seven). Neil will fancy his chances of adding to that total considering his team have scored two or more goals in four of his last five personal H2Hs against Potters (W3, D1, L1).
Players to watch: Liam Delap, son of Stoke legend Rory Delap, joined the club on a season-long loan and will be hoping to start fast after bagging 32 goals in 30 appearances for Man City’s U23 side. Another Premier League loanee, Ellis Simms is looking to add to his tally of three goals across three Sunderland appearances.
Hot streak: The last four H2H meetings at this venue all produced exactly two match goals.