AZ Alkmaar travel to PEC Zwolle on Saturday knowing that a victory could take them up to third in the Eredivisie table, while the hosts could climb into the top half should they manage to claim all three points.
However, John Stegeman's men have a difficult task on their hands given the fact that their visitors remain the only unbeaten team away from home this season.
Match preview
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The Cheeseheads were involved in the last Eredivisie game of 2020 in a 2-2 draw at Utrecht, where they were denied a win courtesy of Adrian Dalmau's leveller in the third minute of added time.
On the other hand, goals in the second half from Mike van Duinen and Clint Leemans ensured that Zwolle claimed a 2-0 away win versus ADO Den Haag four days earlier.
Both sides ended last year in good form with only one defeat in each of their last five league matches, although AZ managed to pick up two more points in that time.
Prior to that, Zwolle were on a dismal run of no wins in six league games, but they have since recorded two-thirds of their current total number of victories.
The decision to stick with Stegeman despite a tumultuous start to the season where fans were calling for his head is gradually paying off as the team seems to have turned a corner in recent weeks.
With the two teams having conceded 22 goals apiece, a better attack - which is second only to Ajax in the entire division - is a key reason as to why AZ are 11 points ahead of Saturday's opponents.
The current margin of 19 in terms of goals scored by each team might have been significantly lower if the Blauwvingers were more clinical in front of goal with their conversion rate at a very low 10% compared to AZ's 21%.
Previous trips to the Mac3Park Stadion for Pascal Jansen's men have been fruitful with only one loss in the last seven years and an unbeaten five-year spell during that span.
PEC Zwolle Eredivisie form: DDWLDW
PEC Zwolle form (all competitions): DWLLDW
AZ Eredivisie form: WLWWWD
AZ form (all competitions): LLWWWD
Team News
On-loan Manchester City forward Slobodan Tedic is the only guaranteed absentee for the home side as he continues to recover from a rib injury he sustained in a stalemate against Emmen last December.
Bruno Martins Indi is still not fit to play yet after damaging his jaw early into the Europa League group stage finale at Rijeka, where his side crashed out.
Dani De Wit was enjoying a fine season having already scored three goals and supplied three assists in 10 games before pulling his hamstring against Groningen, and the Dutch midfielder will be sitting the game out as well.
AZ will also be without Jonas Svensson, who has not featured since November and is not expected to be back until later this month, leaving Yukinari Sugawara with the opportunity to continue at right-back, where he has impressed.
PEC Zwolle possible starting lineup:
Zetterer; Paal, Kersten, Van Polen, Van Wermeskerken; Huiberts, Strieder, Clement; van Duinen, Ghoochannejhad, Reijnders
AZ possible starting lineup:
Bizot; Wijndal, Hatzidiakos, Letschert, Sugawara; Reijnders, Koopmeiners, Midtsjo; Karlsson, Boadu, Stengs
We say: PEC Zwolle 1-2 AZ
The visitors simply have too much firepower for the home team and should be getting all three points at the sound of the final whistle, although you can not bet against the hosts getting on the scoresheet too.
Top betting 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 AZ Alkmaar win with a probability of 58.25%. A win for PEC Zwolle had a probability of 21.35% and a draw had a probability of 20.4%.
The most likely scoreline for an AZ Alkmaar win was 1-2 with a probability of 9.65%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 0-2 (7.76%) and 0-1 (7.19%). The likeliest PEC Zwolle win was 2-1 (5.56%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (8.94%). The actual scoreline of 1-1 was predicted with an 8.9% likelihood.
