Sheffield United play their first Yorkshire derby of the season as they travel to Hull City for a Sunday afternoon kick-off.
The Blades sit top of the league at this early stage, whilst Hull are in 11th place, 3pts behind United.
Hull City under their new manager have started life well after 7 games. They have played a 4-2-3-1 system for the majority of the games so far, however against Coventry City they went with 5 at the back to match the Coventry shape, and I think that’s what they’ll do on Sunday.
Here is how I think the Tigres will line up against us:
Two former Blades youth academy products Tyler Smith and Regan Slater could be set to face United on Sunday. The top goalscorer in the league Oscar Estupinan has bagged 7 goals in 7 games so far including a brace at home against Norwich City, and a hat trick at home against Coventry City.
Hull will be looking for a response this weekend after they suffered a 3-1 defeat away at QPR this midweek.
This is the average player positions map for Hull City against Coventry City when they played a wingback system to match Coventry’s system:
Their number 3, Elder, was pushed into more advanced areas and created a goal. Elder put a high volume of crosses in that game (9). However, on average Hull City have crossed the ball the least amount of times than anyone else this season.
To support Oscar Estupinan in attack, they played with Benjamin Tetteh in a shadow striker role, with attacking midfielder Andy Cannon roaming the middle and final third.
Here is Cannon’s heatmap for the Coventry game:
As I said previously, Cannon’s job was to roam the thirds and often he’d look to rotate off the ball into wide areas so that Hull could create a 2vs1, if the ball was moved quickly, against the opposition wingback where they can work the overlap.
The attacking midfielder created 1 big chance and made 2 key passes in this game and with home advantage, he could be a threat during the periods that Hull control the game.
That being said, Hull City don’t have a lot of possession. On average this season Hull have had 38% possession, the lowest in the division.
They aren’t great at disrupting the opposition’s build-up play either as they rank 2nd from the bottom in that metric, which means they aren’t effective when applying pressure on the ball.
According to the infogol model, Hull City’s performances so far this season should be seeing them sit in 21st place. This is an encouraging sign for the Blades, however, Hull have won 3 from 3 at home this season, and United have won just once in the last 10 away games.