GEORGE ELEK: Table toppers set for tight tussle under Friday night lights

Friday night football is back in The Championship and it doesn’t get much bigger. This is Sunderland v Leeds, top of the league vs the title favourites and a clash of the two teams who believe that they are the biggest outside the Premier League.

For context, Sunderland’s average home attendance is around 41,000 while Leeds’ is 36,000 meaning that, combined, more people go to see Leeds and Sunderland combined each week than Chelsea and Leicester. This is pointless and largely irrelevant information, but hopefully serves a purpose to emphasise the magnitude of this Friday night fixture under the lights at the Stadium of Light.

Sunderland are perfect at home so far this season, winning all four games in front of their own fans and not even conceding a goal. Their crop of talented young players, many of whom can look forward to a career at the top level, are improving week-on-week. Jobe Bellingham may get the headlines, but in Romaine Mundle they seem to have had a ready-made Jack Clarke replacement waiting in the wings ready for their former talisman’s departure.

Manager Regis Le Bris has done a fantastic job sculpting this crop of wonderkids into a functioning football team, but there is some cause of caution when you look at the underlying numbers. Now, as someone who was briefly unwelcome on Wearside after innocently tweeting that Sunderland’s underlying numbers were bad in the ill-fated Jack Ross season, there is a chance what I’m about to write might trigger some PTSD, so a quick disclaimer that I do think the Black Cats are a good side. Maybe just not this good.

Their 16 goals this season come from 11.1xG according to OPTA, which is a significant hot finishing streak which will likely cool off at some point. Their issue is that they are coming up against a Leeds side whose incredible defensive record looks fully sustainable.

Leeds have only conceded 3xG from open play all season and two of the five goals that they’ve conceded so far have been penalties. They are just an absolutely rock solid defensive unit who, given Sunderland’s relatively average chance creation numbers, will likely keep them relatively quiet in terms of big chances. Of course the likes of Mundle, Bellingham and Roberts could still score a worldie, but they’re close enough to their quota on those to make me happy enough to bet against it this time around.

So the crux of any angle here is that Sunderland may struggle to create on Friday night, and that this might not be reflected in the odds, so the next question is whether we fancy Leeds to capitalise?

Maybe, but it’ll be difficult. While Sunderland are running hot in front of goal, they’re also a fantastic defensive unit who give little away. Sheffield Wednesday barely laid a glove on them in the 4-0 win, while Burnley, Middlesbrough and Derby also found chances at a premium.

Leeds are better than those though, and we know that Sunderland will concede soon enough, but it feels unlikely that we’ll see Matteo Joseph, Largie Ramazani and Willie Gnonto run riot in the North-East. Despite being a game where the attacking talent on display will set tongues wagging, this looks a game where the defences may be the dominant force.

I’ll be playing this with a couple of correct score bets, with 0-0 @ 10/1 and a 1-0 away win @ 7/1 looking the two likeliest scores in what could be a game of few chances.