Huddersfield vs Lyon Predictions, Betting Tips and Match Previews

Having stayed in the Premier League last season, Huddersfield will be hoping to move forward this season, though their preparation campaign hasn’t exactly gone swimmingly. Things started well when they beat Bury by four goals to nil in their opening warm-up match, though they’ve since failed to win five on the spin. Getting minutes in the bank and working on new tactics is of course the focus of pre-season, so manager David Wagner won’t be too disappointed with his side, and they have at least secured a couple of decent draws. Having said that, they’ve lost each of their two matches against top-tier opponents, losing 2-0 to Betis and 1-0 to Werder Bremen.

Lyon haven’t been as busy as Huddersfield over the last few weeks, though the work that they have done has been good. Bruno Génésio’s attack-minded team, who scored an impressive 87 goals in Ligue 1 last season, warmed up by drawing 2-2 away at Sion in their first friendly. While they went up a gear against Premier League new boys Fulham last time out, winning by four goals to nil. A similar performance on this occasion would likely be enough to see off a Huddersfield side who’re struggling to get the ball in the net.

Huddersfield proved last season that they’re no mugs; they’re organised, often hard to break down, while they can score goals against certain types of opponents, though they can also be beaten. Even in pre-season, a team of Lyon’s calibre, who can put teams under heaps of pressure with their high-intensity attacking football, ought to have too much for Wagner’s men on this occasion.

Against both Real Betis and Werder Bremen, teams that reside in the top division in Spain and Germany respectively, Huddersfield competed and were typically hard to break down at times, though both of those teams finally broke through, while The Terriers offered little in the offensive third. Since notching four against Bury a fortnight ago, Huddersfield have failed to score against Accrington, Betis and Bremen. Unless they greatly up their forward productivity on this occasion, it’s hard to see them keeping pace with a very good Lyon side.

Aside from the fact that Huddersfield haven’t done too well over the last couple of weeks, Lyon have an excellent record in non-competitive fixtures. Since 2016, the French outfit have won seven out of ten friendlies. During that time, they’ve beat teams such as Benfica, Celtic, Ajax and Sporting Lisbon.

At times Huddersfield can be tough to beat, but the bottom line is that they lack the attacking quality to seriously challenge a Lyon side who tend to score bags of goals. Backing the visitors to head back to France after another momentum-building win is the way to go.