Two struggling sides in the Belarusian Premier League lock horns on Friday evening as Gorodeya welcome Neman to the Gorodeya Stadium.
The hosts are winless in five matches and have slipped down to 12th, one point and one place above opponents Neman after playing a game more.
Match preview
© Reuters
Gorodeya have gone massively off the boil since a run of three successive 1-0 wins in the first half of April, including the scalp of second-place Energetik-BGU.
Oleg Radushko's side, who finished seventh last season, have since lost to BATE and Torpedo-BelAZ, as well as drawing against Rukh Brest, FC Minsk and Slavia Mozyr.
Each of those draws have been by the same 1-1 scoreline, with Denis Yaskovich's first-half goal not enough to earn victory in Mozyr last week.
Given the tight nature of the division from 14th up, however, victory over Neman on Friday could change Gorodeya's campaign entirely, potentially lifting them as high as fifth.
Neman can move as high as seventh with three points, meanwhile, and they have a bit of momentum on their side after seeing off Torpedo 3-1 in their most recent match.
That can be considered a surprise result against an in-form side that are in title contention, particularly on the back of losses to BATE and Rukh in their previous games.
Igor Kovalevich's men found themselves in the relegation playoff zone following those back-to-back losses, but they are now one point above FC Minsk.
Neman have kept three clean sheets this season and they have an opportunity to improve on that return on Friday, with Gorodeya often struggling in front of goal this term.
Indeed, only Smolevichi in the entire division have scored fewer than the hosts' seven goals in 2020, and they have failed to net more than once in a single game.
Gorodeya also have a pretty poor home record, winning just once in front of their fans in four attempts, though Neman have just one point from 12 on their travels.
Gorodeya league form: WLDDLD
Team A form (all competitions): Delete this line if irrelevant
Neman league form: DLWLLW
Head To Head
Gorodeya won both meetings with Neman last season - 3-1 away and 1-0 at the Gorodeya Stadium in the reverse game.
That followed a run of three successive losses in this fixture for Friday's hosts between October 2017 and September 2018.
We say: Gorodeya 0-0 Neman
Neman have yet to win on their travels this term, while Gorodeya hardly boast the best of records at home. There has been very little to separate the teams in the opening couple of months of the campaign and we expect that to reflect in the scoreline on Friday.
Daniel Lewis
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 Neman win with a probability of 37%. A win for Gorodeya had a probability of 33.68% and a draw had a probability of 29.3%.
The most likely scoreline for a Neman win was 0-1 with a probability of 12.72%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 1-2 (7.52%) and 0-2 (7.13%). The likeliest Gorodeya win was 1-0 (11.98%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (13.42%). The actual scoreline of 0-2 was predicted with a 7.1% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted that Neman would win this match.
