Hull City vs Nottingham Forest Predictions

• Hull City have won their last two home games.
• Nottingham Forest have lost two of their last four away league contests.
• Forest are expected to make a number of changes in preparation for the playoffs.

Tigers are value to beat playoff-bound Forest 

Hull City offer excellent value to anyone looking to take on the bookmakers on what could turn out to be another unpredictable final day of the Championship season. Two of the three odds-on shots last year failed to deliver in round 46 and we have to look on Forest’s price of 5/6 here with some skepticism.

Steve Cooper is highly likely to make wholesale changes with home advantage in the second leg if the playoff semi-finals already secure whether the Reds finish third or fourth. His players have been playing lights out for several weeks now and looked pretty drained after the final whistle in Tuesday’s 1-0 loss at the Vitality Stadium that meant their automatic promotion push had failed.

Cooper hasn’t been able to rest and rotate as he would like until now and with Forest’s full focus going into the upcoming playoffs, this game is an opportunity to give key stars a break. Hull have no such dilemma as Shota Arveladze’s side have had time off to reflect on their abject display in losing 5-0 at Bristol City last weekend.

Bumper crowd can cheer hosts to victory

The Tigers have won back-to-back games at the MKM Stadium, however, and are set to be cheered on by their biggest home league crowd in five years this weekend. The jury still seems to be out on Arveladze, who clearly read it wrong last weekend, but results have improved slightly under the Georgian.

This is more of a price play than anything else but Hull City have won three of their last five Championship games and deserve more respect than the general quote of around 4/1 affords them here. Forest have won six of their last 15 away games and came unstuck at Cardiff, who sit below Hull right now, in January.

That was one of only two occasions when the Reds have conceded multiple away goals in the league this term, so expectations for correct score forecasting of a Hull win should generally stop at 1-0 or 2-1. The Tigers might be able to shut up shop for the win if they score first against players lacking match sharpness or motivation, so we will take the former – a 1-0 Tigers win.