Norwich City will be out to keep hold of top spot in the Championship when they travel to a badly out of form Cardiff City side on Saturday afternoon.
The Canaries returned to winning ways last time out in the league and are now four points clear at the summit, while Cardiff are down in 15th following a poor run of results.
Match preview
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Emiliano Buendia's seventh league goal of the campaign, adding to his six assists, earned Norwich a 1-0 win over Barnsley in their most recent Championship match.
That ended a three-game wait for a victory following a slender loss to Watford and a home draw with Queens Park Rangers, and they have since cruised past Coventry City in the FA Cup third round.
Daniel Farke's men enter this clash in good shape, then, as they look to keep second-placed Swansea City and third-in-the-table Bournemouth, five points worse off, at arm's length.
Incredibly, Norwich have an identical record at the midway point of this season as they had in 2018-19 when going on to win the Championship title.
They will be looking to add another three points to their tally in South Wales this weekend against a Cardiff side now eight points adrift of the playoffs.
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The Bluebirds revived their campaign with four victories in a row heading into the festive period, but they have since lost five of their last six in all competitions.
That includes a run of four successive losses, most recently going down 1-0 to fellow second-tier side Nottingham Forest in the third round of the FA Cup.
Not since January 2018 have City lost four Championship games on the spin, with another defeat on Saturday possibly being enough to bring an end to Neil Harris's tenure.
Cardiff have lost five of their last seven league meetings with Norwich, though they did win 3-1 the last time they hosted the Canaries in December 2017.
Cardiff City Championship form: WLWLLL
Cardiff City form (all competitions): LWLLLL
Norwich City Championship form: WWWLDW
Norwich City form (all competitions): WWLDWW
Team News
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Popular Cardiff defender Sol Bamba was this week diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin lymphoma and has started chemotherapy, putting City's so-called central-defensive injury crisis into some perspective.
Harris has some big decisions to make across the field as he desperately attempts to find a winning formula, though he will have to do so without influential attacking pair Kieffer Moore and Lee Tomlin, who remain on the sidelines.
After rotating for the cup loss to Forest, the hosts will revert back to something close to the same XI that started against Wycombe Wanderers a fortnight ago.
Norwich are still without goalkeeper Tim Krul, who recently tested positive for coronavirus, so Daniel Barden may get the nod for this game after starting the cup win over Coventry.
The likes of Teemu Pukki, Max Aarons and Oliver Skipp were all left out of the XI against Coventry but are pushing for inclusion here.
Norwich's last 12 away Championship goals have been scored by either Pukki (eight) or Buendia (four).
Cardiff City possible starting lineup:
Smithies; Bacuna, Cunningham, Nelson, Bennett; Vaulks, Ralls; Ojo, Wilson, Hoilett; Glatzel
Norwich City possible starting lineup:
Barden; Aarons, Hanley, Gibson, Sorensen; Skipp, McLean; Buendia, Vrancic, Cantwell; Pukki
We say: Cardiff City 0-2 Norwich City
Norwich are flying high at the top of the division, while Cardiff are without a point in three league outings.
The Canaries were 2-0 winners when these sides met at Carrow Road just before Christmas and we are predicting this game to finish the same way.
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 Norwich City win with a probability of 38.18%. A win for Cardiff City had a probability of 34.61% and a draw had a probability of 27.2%.
The most likely scoreline for a Norwich City win was 0-1 with a probability of 10.79%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 1-2 (8.19%) and 0-2 (6.85%). The likeliest Cardiff City win was 1-0 (10.16%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (12.9%). The actual scoreline of 1-2 was predicted with an 8.2% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted that Norwich City would win this match.
