West Brom vs Huddersfield prediction: ENGLAND: Championship betting tips on match 2023-09-01 14:00.
West Brom have done a good job of bouncing back from their opening-day defeat to Blackburn by going undefeated in each of their three Championship fixtures since (W2, D1). Their latest victims were ten-man Middlesbrough (4-2), and whilst pleased to see his side win, manager Carlos Corberán claimed in the wake of that result his team needed to keep “improving”.
Only once across the last 13 seasons in either of England’s top two divisions have West Brom picked up more than their seven points from their opening four games, so they’ve certainly laid some good foundations upon which to build. They’re favourites to add to that tally here, although just one win from the last five H2Hs (D2, L2) indicates that Huddersfield have proven to be tricky adversaries of late.
Form certainly isn’t with the visiting side, who are winless in all five competitive matches (D1, L4) this season, including a morale damaging 4-0 home defeat to Norwich last time out. Terriers boss Neil Warnock felt his side couldn’t have done “any more” in terms of effort, but after four Championship rounds there’s only one side who have conceded more goals (nine) and none who have netted less (two), so he needs to find something fast to avoid another battle at the basement this season.
Things unravelled quickly for Huddersfield last week when they shipped two goals inside the opening 20 minutes to Norwich, and Warnock would love to see his side inflict something similar on West Brom, particularly as slow attacking starts have been a trait of theirs for a while. The Terriers are one of only six Championship sides yet to score inside 30 minutes this season, and they’ve not bagged at all during this period in any game since a 2-2 draw with Blackburn at the start of April!
Key battle: Brandon Thomas-Asante looks set to play a big role for West Brom this season – he has netted in the ten minutes after half-time in each of his last two appearances. Trying to thwart him will be Huddersfield goalkeeper Lee Nicholls who had made the second most saves in the division after four rounds (16).
Hot stat: Only one of the last nine league H2Hs have seen the away side on the day secure victory.