Stoke vs Hull – Match Preview

Stoke manager Mark Hughes is under pressure not necessarily in a bid to keep his club up, although that job is not quite complete but more to make sure he is still in a job come the end of the season. It’s a worrying run of form right now and one that could do with coming to an end sooner rather than later.

That’s because Stoke are now on a run of four straight defeats and five games without a win, a run of results which has seen them slip to 13th in the table. Today they will look to end that miserable and improve their league position with the visit of Hull to the Bet365 Stadium.

Last weekend it was defeat number four for Stoke in this barren run as they were overturned by Liverpool even after taking the lead through Jonathan Walters first half strike. The pressure that is on manager Hughes is the fact that some feel that he has taken the club as far as he possibly can.

After two ninth place finishes the club have seemed to go backwards this season, but that is more due to the premier league mid table being so congested, the situation being that two wins in a row can take you in the top half while a run that Stoke are in leaves them in the position that they find themselves.

If Stoke and Mark Hughes do part company at the end of the season then they will have to then find out if the grass is greener on the other side. But in fairness to Hughes unless his club do a ‘Leicester’ then they highest they can realistically hope for is 8th place this or in any other season.

So it’s not a real crisis but the perceived backwards step is raising an alarm in some quarters and you get the feeling that Stoke are going to have to finish strongly to make sure the former Wales manager still has employment going into next season.

Hull will look to take full advantage of Stoke’s lack of form and look to pick up another all important three points this afternoon. Nothing really changed last weekend as they and Swansea both lost their respective away games so it is as you were in 17th and 18th in the table.

Hull are two points clear of Swansea and in fairness their trip to Manchester City was always going to be the free hit, the two wins before last weekend were vital. It was more a case of looking at the goings on in East London and making sure Paul Clement’s men did not pick up any points.

Thankfully they did not and Marco Silva’s side are still on the correct side of the drop zone. Their away form has been not been impressive as that as of their home form and that is a situation they will look to rectify. If City was a free hit last Saturday, then Stoke has to be a knockout punch.

These are the games that the Hull players and staff will have identified that are very much winnable, perhaps even more so with the plight that Stoke are currently in. The question though is can Hull earn the all important three points and get more daylight between themselves them and Swansea.

Not only that it would be a three points that drags more teams into the relegation battle and just makes life difficult for a couple of other clubs. All runs have to come to an end soon and couple that with Hull’s shaky form on the road, means for me I think this will end up a share of the points. A draw for Hull but perhaps one they will disappointed with.