Chennaiyin vs Jamshedpur: Preview and Prediction
Chennaiyin will lock horns with Jamshedpur in ‘Match 96’ of the 2021-22 Indian Super League season at the Tilak Maidan Stadium on Saturday. Jamshedpur will look to strengthen their position in the top four while this could be the last shot at a far-fetched semi-final position for Chennaiyin.
The Red Miners have been consistent right from the start of the season and have lost only four of their 15 matches. They are occupying third place in the standings with 28 points to their name.
On the other hand, The Marina Machans has had a horrendous second half of the competition after an impressive start. They have slipped down to the eighth position, having accumulated 10 points from 17 matches.
Current Form
The Jamshedpur camp will be packed to the brim with conviction since they are among the only two teams to have won their last couple of matches. In their last game, Owen Coyle’s men secured a 3-2 win over Mumbai City.
They scored thrice in the match before that against Kerala Blasters as well, while also keeping a clean sheet. These two triumphs have got the Red Miners’ campaign back on track after a 3-1 defeat against Bengaluru came as a hammer blow.
There is hardly anything that the Chennaiyin players can be cheerful about, as barring East Bengal, they are the only team who have failed to win any of their last five matches. The two-time champions have gathered only a solitary point from their last three fixtures.
That point came in the last game against Odisha, which produced a 2-2 thriller. Before taking on the Kalinga Warriors, Chennaiyin suffered back-to-back defeats – a 5-0 humbling against Goa and a 1-0 loss against Bengaluru.
Head to Head Record
Chennaiyin holds the upper hand in terms of head-to-head records, as they have won four of the nine meetings against Jamshedpur. The Red Miners have had the last laugh only twice, with three matches ending stalemates.
The first meeting of this season produced a 1-0 scoreline in Chennaiyin’s favor. Polish striker Lukasz Gikiewicz’s 31st-minute winner turned out to be the differentiating factor as Coyle’s men failed to breach the Marina Machans’ defense.
Team News
Alex Lima could return in Jamshedpur’s midfield
Syed Subir Pasha carried out experiments aplenty in his first game in charge as the interim head coach of Chennaiyin. A few players like Rahim Ali, Anirudh Thapa, and Edwin Sydney Vanspaul were assigned unfamiliar roles while the team was set up in a 4-3-2-1 formation.
Since his team had a fairly decent last game against Odisha, we could see a repeat of the same set-up in this match, except with one personnel change. Narayan Das could be replaced by Jerry Lalrinzuala in the left-back position.
Coyle is expected to make two changes to his starting XI, despite the 3-2 win against Mumbai City. English defender Peter Hartley looked shaky in defense and he might have to make way for Narender Gehlot.
This will then allow the former Burnley manager to free up an overseas slot, which he can utilize by replacing an underperforming Pronay Halder with Brazilian midfielder Alex Lima.
Predicted Starting Lineups
Chennaiyin (4-2-3-1): Debjit Majumder; Edwin Sydney Vanspaul, Deepak Devrani, Slavko Damjanovic, Jerry Lalrinzuala; Rahim Ali, Ariel Borysiuk, Ninthoinganba Meetei; Vladimir Koman, Anirudh Thapa; Nerijus Valskis.
Jamshedpur (4-2-3-1): TP Rehenesh; Laldiana Renthlei, Narender Gehlot, Eli Sabia, Ricky Lallawmawma; Alex Lima, Jitendra Singh, Boris Singh Thangjam, Greg Stewart, Ritwik Das; Daniel Chima Chukwu.
Prediction
Though Chennaiyin tends to up the ante whenever they come across Jamshedpur, the recently-formed gulf between these two sides in terms of quality on paper makes the latter favorites of this game. Hence, we have predicted a 1-0 scoreline in the Red Miners’ favor.