Round 23 of the 2021-22 Eredivisie season kicks off with a meeting between Fortuna Sittard and Sparta Rotterdam at the Fortuna Sittard Stadion on Friday.
Both teams head into the clash off the back of victories in their respective last outings, and they will be looking to pick up where they left off.
Match preview
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Sparta ended a run of 10 games without a victory across all competitions by narrowly beating Willem II 1-0 at the Het Kasteel on Sunday.
Younes Namli opened the scoring just shy of the hour mark and that was enough to secure all three points for Henk Fraser's men in Rotterdam.
De Kasteelheren remain bottom but one in the Eredivisie table but are now just four points adrift of safety following their most recent triumph last time out.
Next up is a crunch clash versus an opposing side who have won just one of the last nine meetings between the sides, suffering four defeats and managing four stalemates in that time.
Friday's visitors claimed a 3-1 victory in September's reverse fixture and have the chance to complete a league double over their hosts for the first time in history.
Fortuna Sittard recorded consecutive league wins for the first time this term courtesy of a 1-0 victory over Groningen at the Euroborg on Saturday.
Off the back of a relatively uneventful first half, the game sprung to life in the second period where Dimitrios Siovas popped up with an 82nd-minute winner.
Sjors Ultee's men head into this weekend's contest two points and one place ahead of their next opponents in the standings, and a victory would take them out of the drop zone, albeit temporarily.
Having scored the joint-fewest number of goals in the entire division, the Fortunezen will need to get going at the attacking end of the pitch if they are to steer clear of danger.
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Team News
Lennart Thy was on target in the reverse fixture, but the 29-year-old heads into Friday's game with just one goal in his last 20 appearances across all competitions.
January signing Younes Namli opened his account for Sparta against Willem II last time out, and the midfielder will be aiming to come up trumps once again.
Despite making his return to the bench in the aforementioned match, Benjamin van Leer is not expected to feature, with Maduka Okoye set to retain his place between the sticks.
Samy Baghdadi has recently returned from an injury layoff, and the Frenchman could make his return to action this weekend after sitting out the last six games due to a knee injury.
With three goals in his last three home matches for Sittard, forward Zian Flemming is one to keep an eye on having come alive in the second half of the season.
Fortuna Sittard possible starting lineup:
Van Osch; Siovas, Samaris, Angha; Janssen, Duarte, Rienstra, Tirpan; Flemming, Seuntjens, Benschop
Sparta Rotterdam possible starting lineup:
Okoye; Durmisi, Auassar, Vriends, Abels; Namli, De Kamps, Verschueren, Van Crooy; Engels, Thy
We say: Fortuna Sittard 1-1 Sparta Rotterdam
With both teams languishing in the lower echelons of the table, we expect a nervy and cagey affair in this one and a share of the spoils come the end of the 90 minutes.
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 Fortuna Sittard win with a probability of 47.41%. A win for Sparta Rotterdam had a probability of 26.85% and a draw had a probability of 25.7%.
The most likely scoreline for a Fortuna Sittard win was 1-0 with a probability of 11.43%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-1 (9.25%) and 2-0 (8.64%). The likeliest Sparta Rotterdam win was 0-1 (8.1%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (12.23%). The actual scoreline of 3-0 was predicted with a 4.4% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted that Fortuna Sittard would win this match.
