Huddersfield v Crystal Palace preview: Wilfried Zaha set to start

Crystal Palace will look to overturn a run of four straight defeats which have seen them drop into the Premier League relegation zone when they travel to Huddersfield Town on Saturday.

The Eagles will have Wilfried Zaha fit again to start after the influential winger returned from injury at half-time during the 2-1 defeat at Chelsea last weekend.

But boss Roy Hodgson is conscious of putting too much pressure on the Ivory Coast international.

He said: "Players have periods of form, and neither Wilf nor I can guarantee that he's going to be able to find that level of form again, which probably put him as one of the most desired players outside of the top six.

"We hope so, and believe it, and there's no doubt Wilf will be doing his absolute best to show that, but I'd rather not put him under that much pressure.

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Huddersfield have lost six of nine but are unbeaten in their last three, and arguably should have made it three successive wins last weekend when they racked up over 80 per cent of possession against Swansea, but were held to a 0-0 draw.

That surge has pulled them up to 15th in the table, four points above the bottom three.

Team news

Danny Williams will miss the rest of the season for Huddersfield, having fractured his leg in training, but Elias Kachunga may feature after returning to training following a long lay-off.

Terence Kongolo will also miss out, but could be fit to return after the international break.

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Zaha, Mamadou Sakho, Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Yohan Cabaye have returned to training for Palace and are available.

Long-term absentees Bakary Sako (ankle), Joel Ward (muscular), Scott Dann, Jason Puncheon (both knee) and Connor Wickham (lacking match fitness) are not expected to feature.

Opta stats

• Palace are winless in four league meetings with Huddersfield (D2 L2), though they did beat them in the EFL Cup in their last meeting back in September.
• Only bottom club West Bromwich Albion (4) have earned fewer Premier League points in 2018 than Huddersfield (7 - W2 D1 L6)
• Huddersfield have failed to score in a league-high 16 different Premier League games this season.
• Palace have lost four league games in a row for the first time under Roy Hodgson, meaning they've now lost 4+ consecutively under each of their last four permanent managers (Hodgson, Frank De Boer, Sam Allardyce and Alan Pardew). The last to lose five in a row was Pardew in November 2016 (a run of six).

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Merson's prediction

I watched Huddersfield last week playing against 10 men for 79 minutes plus stoppage-time and they never looked like scoring. Palace, meanwhile, should have got a result at Chelsea in all honesty. With Wilfried Zaha back to fitness and back in the team, I fancy them to get a massive result.

PAUL PREDICTS: 1-2 (9/1 with Sky Bet)

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