The Championship season traditionally ends with the play-offs and despite the suspension for Covid-19 delaying everything, nothing has changed in that regard. The postseason competition gets underway at the Liberty Stadium on Sunday evening when Swansea City host Brentford.
This is the first leg of a two-legged tie from which the winners will progress to the play-off final where they will be a 90 minute showdown away from the final spot in the Premier League next season.
Where to watch
The entire match is live on the Sky Sports Football channel. The build up to the contest begins at 6pm and the match itself kicks off at 6.30pm. The second half is also live on Sky Main Event.
Swansea City
Swansea were the last team into the play-offs and they will be hoping that they will be the last ones standing as well. Just being here is incredible for the Welsh outfit as they needed a crazy turnaround on the final night of the season just to make it in. They needed to win, hope Nottingham Forest lost and make up six goals in the process and as luck would have it that is exactly what happened, so Steve Cooper’s men will be full of confidence here.
The concern for Swansea would be that they have been a little hit and miss at the Liberty Stadium over the course of the regular season and have only scored three goals in their last five outings there. They are likely to need to improve on that if they are going to come through this tie, although with their form on the road being much stronger, just staying in the tie could be deemed a success and would give them every chance of progressing.
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Brentford
If Swansea City are delighted to be in the play-offs, this will be the last place Brentford will have wanted to be. They looked to be cruising towards automatic promotion when they won their first seven matches after lockdown to add to the one they went into the break with. We now know they needed two points from their final two matches of the season against lowly Stoke City and Barnsley, but losing both meant they bottled a great chance to secure promotion.
They now have the issue of picking themselves up off the floor for this match. That isn’t going to be easy because you only had to see them at the end of the encounter with Barnsley to know they were a shell-shocked side. Usually between the regular season and the play-offs there is a week or so for teams to regroup and go again but Brentford have had four days. It would take an extraordinary effort for them to be on it here.
Team News
Swansea will be without a couple of key players with Freddie Woodman and George Byers definitely out of this match while Kyle Naughton is suspended. Mike van der Hoorn and Wayne Routledge are being monitored ahead of the contest.
Mathias Jensen is pushing for a recall for Brentford. He has been a key figure in the heart of the midfield so a return for him would not be out of the question. Thomas Frank has a full squad to choose from though which is one positive for his side.
Betting
I’ve got to be against Brentford here. The positive for the Londoners is that they won both the regular season meetings between the two teams but they hadn’t made a monumental bottle job of promotion going into either of those. Brentford don’t have the best of records with the play-offs either so although there are no fans to create further anxiety, don’t think that their players won’t be aware of the history.
There is a chance that both sides will settle for the draw in this match. It would allow Swansea City to be in the game away from home where their best football has come since the restart, and it would give Brentford another three days to come to terms with missing out on automatic promotion. I have to be against Brentford though whether that is with a Swansea win or a draw. You can get 4/5 on that combination in the double chance market and with Brentford having to be a little flat that’s the bet for me.
Tips
WON – Back Swansea-Draw Double Chance for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with Sky Bet
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