Odds on favourites

This weekend sees Portsmouth come to molineux having failed to get any points from their opening 7 games of the season. They will surely get a point soon, but hopefully not too soon. Having sold all their best players and largely replaced them with players that look Championship level, it does look like it will be a long season for Pompey but they won’t lose every game.

The poor start for Pompey has lead to Wolves being priced up as odds on favourites to win by the bookies – not often that has happened in the Premier League. But if Wolves can play to the level they have reached in most games this season then a valuable 3 points should come our way.

Team selection is open to question for this game. Although McCarthy tends to stick with players playing well he might use the 5-2 defeat last week as a reason to make one or two changes even though the team performance was quite good. Players like Foley, Craddock, Stearman and Ebanks Blake are now fit and will be knocking on the door for a game and there has to come a time when the best players get the nod.

Hennessey will keep his place. Defensively there are many contenders. Foley as last year’s player of the season must get a chance soon and I hope that is tomorrow. The rest of the defence may stay as Mancienne, Berra and Elokobi. But the experience of Craddock might have been missed last week and it is possible he could be paired with Berra with Mancienne moved to left back where he played for QPR when on loan there.

In midfield Kightly will surely start as will Henry. Jarvis will probably retain his place on the left although he has not been at his best. That leaves a choice between Edwards and Castillo for the other central midfield position. The hamstring problem that Castillo picked up a week ago might decide that. David Jones meanwhile has had surgery and will be out for two months.

Up front McCarthy has to decide whether the time is right to reintroduce SEB, who hasn’t looked fully wound up in his two sub appearances but probably needs games to get sharp. Doyle has been excellent as will certainly play and Keogh would be unlucky to be left out.

This is the last game before another international break and three points would see Wolves sitting towards half way in the league for the next fortnight. But those points may well be needed to avoid slipping in to the bottom three, and the run of four games before the following international break sees a more difficult looking run of games against Arsenal and Villa at home and Everton and Stoke away.

Category: Team News

Tags: Team News

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