Wolverhampton Wanderers and Birmingham City come head to head in a West Midlands derby at Molineux on Sunday with the home side looking to climb out of the Premier League's bottom three.
Molineux plays host to what is bound to be a hotly contested match between two Premiership teams tipped to struggle at the start of the season who are in contrasting form.
The Blues are currently five points better off than Wolves in the table and sit pretty in 13th while Mick McCarthy's men struggle in 19th
Wolves haven’t won since September when they beat Fulham at home and are on a poor run of 7 Premiership matches without a victory. Whereas Birmingham are on a 4 match unbeaten run in the Premier League and picked up credible draws against Manchester City and Liverpool along the way.
The longer Mick McCarthy’s Wolves team go without a victory, the bigger the pressure will be on the manager who will be disappointed with his team’s recent performances. In their last 2 matches they have conceded 8 goals and were outclassed by both Arsenal and Chelsea, and worryingly for Wolves fans they can’t score and are shipping goals at the other end. Wolves have scored just 5 goals in 6 Premiership matches at Molineux this season.
Wolves are boosted by the return of striker Kevin Doyle for Sunday's Premier League derby against Birmingham at Molineux.
Doyle was rested for the 4-0 reversal at Chelsea last weekend after playing for the Republic of Ireland in their two-legged World Cup play-off against France.
But defender Ronald Zubar has suffered another injury setback and has been ruled out of the clash with Alex McLeish's side.
Right-back Zubar missed the game with Chelsea via a thigh strain sustained in training. The 24-year-old returned to training on Thursday but suffered an ankle setback.
Manager Alex McLeish has made his Birmingham side hard to break down and whilst it might not be very pretty, it is extremely effective.
Birmingham have picked up a bit of form going into the clash having gone four games unbeaten including wins over Sunderland and Fulham and a credible draw at home to Manchester City.
Birmingham will again be without striker Garry O'Connor and on-loan Sunderland midfielder Teemu Tainio.
O'Connor has undergone surgery on a hip problem and will be out of action for several months while Tainio will require a knee operation which will also sideline him for a lengthy period.
Club captain Damien Johnson is available after a hamstring injury but is likely to be on the substitutes' bench after the loaning out of Jordon Mutch to Hereford.
REVIEW: