Stoke City fell to their first defeat under new manager, Michael O’Neill on Tuesday night when they lost 1-0 away from home against Cardiff City but nevertheless, there’s an air of renewed optimism around the bet365 Stadium following the arrival of the Northern Ireland manager.
Stoke had recently posted back-to-back wins against Barnsley 4-2 away and a 2-1 home win against Wigan Athletic which started O’Neill’s tenure with The Potters on a postive note, and they return to the bet365 Stadium for this Saturday’s clash against Blackburn Rovers.
O’Neill now has a job on his hands though to repair the damage under former boss, Nathan Jones, who was given an inordinate amount of time to turn things around at Stoke but without success, but there’s a glimmer of hope offered by the fact that Stoke have won 2 of their last 3 matches at home in the Championship.
A 2-0 win over Fulham was a surprisingly good result, but 6 defeats from their 9 home games to date means the goals markets look the better option - indeed, 5 of Stoke’s 9 ho e matches have seen both teams score and Stoke have managed just 1 clean sheet so far this term at home.
Onto Blackburn Rovers and the visitors ground out a 1-0 home win in midweek against Brentford to hand Rovers a third win in four matches under manager, Tony Mowbray, whose side had collected previous wins over Sheffield Wednesday and Barnsley.
The midweek win over Brentford has lifted Blackburn up into 13th place in the Championship although having lost 6 of their 8 away matches so far this season, further points at the bet365 Stadium look far from guaranteed.
Blackburn have managed to record just 2 wins out of these 8 away matches which were gained at Hull City and Reading but with just 1 clean sheet on the road along with losing their last 4 matches on the trot on their travels, this gives Stoke City a real fighting chance of getting something out of this encounter.
In addition, the visitors have won just 4 of their last 17 on the road in the Championship so the straight win appears to be risky at best, but 5 of their 8 away matches have also seen both teams score.
In the head-to-heads, 5 of the previous 6 meetings between these two teams have resulted in both teams scoring and this could be the outcome in today’s clash.
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