Nigel Adkins deserves more credit at Hull, Tony Pulis feeling the pressure at Middlesbrough and Colin Calderwood enters the fray at Cambridge.
Friday 21 December 2018 11:14, UK
We cast our eye over five things to look out for in the Sky Bet Championship, League One and League Two this weekend.
It is not an easy situation at Hull at the moment. In fact not long ago it seemed as though the club were nailed on for a relegation battle this season.
An upturn in form, however, which has seen them lose just one of their last eight games, has seen them climb to the heady heights of 17th in the Sky Bet Championship table.
Nigel Adkins has done a fine job of steadying a seemingly unsteady-able ship, and it looks as though he will have to go without any financial backing again in January. "We're not in a position where we'll go out and spend money at this moment in time," he admitted. "We tried to sign players in the summer and that didn't materialise. I'm not envisaging us going out and spending money on transfer fees at this present moment in time."
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A victory over Swansea, whom they face live on Sky Sports Football on Saturday evening, would take them to 27 points, which is one more than they managed to reach by mid-February last season.
Maybe one day things will improve away from the pitch as well, which should allow Adkins the chance he deserves to aim for more than comfortable survival at the KCOM Stadium.
Tony Pulis is approaching his one-year anniversary at Middlesbrough, but the situation isn't exactly rosy at the Riverside Stadium.
Their form has tailed off in the last few weeks in the Championship and their lack of goalscoring prowess has been exposed by an increased leakiness in their defence in recent weeks. Boro have conceded as many goals in their past five league games as they did in their first 17.
At the other end of the pitch they have scored just 24 goals, fewer than any side in the top 15 of the Championship and just two draws in their last four games have seen them drop from automatic-promotion contenders to almost out of the top six altogether.
A dip in results in the league is one thing, but a failure to see off League One Burton at home in the quarter-finals of the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night was another altogether. Opportunities to reach the last four of a major cup competition don't come around too often for a club like Boro and that was a huge one missed.
Fans of any club can usually tolerate Pulis-ball when it leads to victories, but defensive play and a lack of success usually only goes one way. The Boro boss has some critics to silence at Reading on Saturday.
It's not looking good for Thomas Frank. At one point Brentford seemed to be in a top-six battle but now they have slid all the way down to 19th in the table.
It's worth remembering that this dip in form started under Dean Smith, but the Bees have continued to nosedive under Frank, picking up just four points from his 10 games in charge. Only Bolton, whom they face on Saturday at Griffin Park, have fewer (three points) in that time.
But how worried should they be? George Elek from the 'Not The Top 20 Podcast' was on EFL Matters on Thursday and he believes that, although things need to turn around fast, Brentford still have enough quality at their disposal to do it.
"You could always rely on Brentford to create chances even if they weren't scoring goals, but now they aren't even doing that," he said. "The defensive mistakes are terrible and with it being a young squad and a manager without much Championship experience, you've got to be really concerned.
"But they have got good players, and some like Neal Maupay and Ollie Watkins who are wanted by Premier League clubs, so you would think this run has to end soon."
It has been just over eight years since Portsmouth and Sunderland last met, and on that occasion it was in the Premier League.
Unsurprisingly it is only Lee Cattermole who has survived from that fixture, a 1-1 draw at Fratton Park, in a season that ended in Pompey's relegation. Less surprisingly, Cattermole was sent off in that game.
Since then, Portsmouth have been down to League Two before beginning the slow climb back, while Sunderland have just suffered back-to-back relegations.
Now, both clubs are in decent shape and seem the two best bets for promotion this season. Portsmouth have suffered a rare blip, losing and drawing their last two games, while Sunderland are five points behind ahead of their trip to the south coast, although they have two games in hand.
Portsmouth remain the outright title favourites with Sky Bet, but a positive result for Sunderland on Saturday could turn that on its head, and give themselves great momentum heading into Christmas.
Having left Aston Villa at the same time as Steve Bruce in October, Colin Calderwood has decided to venture out on his own again and become a No 1 once more.
He previously worked as an assistant under Chris Hughton at Newcastle, Birmingham, Norwich and Brighton, and would have still been at the Seagulls in the Premier League had he not made the switch to Villa in 2016.
Calderwood's management career started successfully at Northampton as he won promotion from League Two in 2006, but a stint at Nottingham Forest followed that was less succesful, and his latest attempt at Hibernian, between shifts under Hughton and Newcastle and Birmingham, saw him sacked after just after a year.
He now takes over a Cambridge side in a little bit of jeopardy, hovering one spot and one point above the relegation zone in Sky Bet League Two.
They have won just five games all season but Calderwood's first game is a big one, as they travel to fellow strugglers Morecambe. Victory would see them leap above their opponents and potentially up to 19th, while defeat could leave them in the relegation zone.
