Sunderland vs Tranmere Predictions

Sunderland will be looking for a turnaround in fortunes after back-to-back league defeats when they welcome Tranmere to Stadium of Light on Tuesday evening. The visitors go in search of a three-game unbeaten run.

Phil Parkinson’s first match as Sunderland boss didn’t exactly go to plan, as the Black Cats lost by a goal to nil away against high-flyers Wycombe. Their league position of 10^th is far from terrible, but for a club desperate to leave the third division behind, it’s not ideal.

It’s far too early to judge Sunderland under Parkinson, if we look at them overall, many of last seasons’ issues remain. As was the case last season, they don’t give much away and are almost never well beaten, but they’re struggling to score lots of goals on a regular basis and are sometimes struggling to create meaningful scoring opportunities.

However, at home the Black Cats have performed well this term, winning three and drawing two. No clean in five is a worry, though it must be said that they’ve been unlucky. An average of 0.51 expected goals against tells us that Sunderland have done a good job of restricting teams. If they can maintain such an average, then clean sheets should soon start to appear.

While Sunderland look a better side at home than the bare results suggest, Tranmere have generally been as poor on the road as the bare results would have us believe. They did beat a useful Coventry side in their most recent away match, but were lucky to do so, that’s for sure. Prior to that fortuitous win, Tuesday’s visitors had lost four and drawn one of their five away matches.

Unlike the Black Cats, who’ve generally prevented teams from creating much at the Stadium of Light, Tranmere have given an abundance of chances away on their travels. Not only have they conceded 12 goals in six travelling matches, Micky Mellon’s men have given up a poor average of 2.01 expected goals, which shows that they’ve given away the chances to concede twice per game. This is made worse by the fact that they’re averaging just 0.67 expected goals for, which is why they’ve scored so few times away from home.

Sunderland are undoubtedly the likely winners of this match, but their early price very much reflects that. Punters looking to get involved in this game should get a run for their money out of ‘Sunderland Win to Nil’ at a decent price. Sunderland may have conceded in each of their home games, but strong underlying numbers suggest that it won’t be long before they start shutting teams out, and a home game against a weak Tranmere side presents the Black Cats with the perfect opportunity to do just that.