Off the back of victories in their respective last outings, Feyenoord and Heerenveen lock horns at De Kuip in matchday six of the 2021-22 Eredivisie season.
The sides have made positive starts to the new campaign with the visitors in third place, one point and two places above the hosts who have played a game less.
Match preview
© Reuters
Feyenoord claimed an impressive 4-0 win against PSV at the Philips Stadion on Sunday to put an end to the only remaining 100% record this season.
Jens Toornstra grabbed two of his side's four goals with Bryan Linssen and Cyriel Dessers also hitting the target for Arne Slot's men in Eindhoven.
De Stadionclub put an end to a three-game winless run in emphatic style and now have their sights set on stringing together a fine run of results in the coming weeks.
Next up for them is a mouth-watering tie against a Heerenveen side who emerged victorious in two of the three meetings between the teams last season.
However, Wednesday's hosts have the second-best defensive record behind Ajax and will be confident of keeping their visitors at bay this time.
Heerenveen ended a run of two games without a victory following a narrow 1-0 triumph against Fortuna Sittard at the Abe Lenstra Stadion on Saturday.
Johnny Jansen's men broke the deadlock in the fifth minute through Henk Veerman, and that turned out to be enough to secure all three points.
Consequently, De Superfriezen have moved up into third place on the log, three points off the top after the first five rounds of matches.
While it remains to be seen whether Wednesday's visitors can maintain their place in the upper echelons of the standings, current evidence suggests that they might just be on course to do that.
- W
- W
- L
- W
- W
- W
- L
- L
- D
- W
- W
- W
- L
- D
- W
- D
- W
- W
- L
- D
- W
Team News
© Reuters
Twenty-seven-year-old Mark Diemers remains Feyenoord's only unavailable player, as he is yet to recover from a knee injury which he sustained in July.
Following his impact off the bench in the last game where he was directly involved in two goals in just 10 minutes of play, Cyriel Dessers could be named in the starting lineup.
Heerenveen's Pawel Bochniewicz is ruled out of Wednesday's contest with a knee injury which he suffered during his side's pre-season campaign.
Defender Rami Kaib is also not expected to be in action for the home side as he is set to sit out a fourth game on the bounce due to a jaw injury.
Feyenoord possible starting lineup:
Bijlow; Malacia, Senesi, Trauner, Pedersen; Kokcu, Aursnes, Toornstra; Sinisterra, Jahanbakhsh, Til
Heerenveen possible starting lineup:
Mulder; Dresevic, Woudenberg, Van Beek, Van Ewijk; J.Veerman, Halilovic, Madsen; De Jong, H.Veerman, Nygren
We say: Feyenoord 2-1 Heerenveen
Both sides have a real chance of coming away with all three points in a game that could easily swing either way. However, we fancy the home side to carry the day, but only after they have been pushed all the way by their visitors.
Top tip
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Feyenoord win with a probability of 68.54%. A draw had a probability of 18.3% and a win for Heerenveen had a probability of 13.11%.
The most likely scoreline for a Feyenoord win was 2-0 with a probability of 11.15%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 1-0 (9.92%) and 2-1 (9.73%). The likeliest drawn scoreline was 1-1 (8.65%), while for a Heerenveen win it was 0-1 (3.84%). The actual scoreline of 3-1 was predicted with a 7.3% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted that Feyenoord would win this match.
