Swansea City vs Burnley. Premier League.
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Saturday 4 March 2017 10:46, UK
Burnley are set to welcome back Jeff Hendrick for their Premier League trip to Swansea on Saturday.
The Republic of Ireland international has been serving a three-match ban after being sent off against Watford at the start of February.
But he will return as the Clarets embark on the second of four successive away trips.
They won just their second away point of the season last time out with a 1-1 draw at Hull, but face a Swansea side whose form has improved since the arrival of head coach Paul Clement.
The Swans have won three of their last five matches to pull themselves out of the relegation zone.
Clement says his players are "very, very hungry to stay and play at this level".
"We have just come through a tough run of games but we have picked up a good number of points, and we will try to do the same thing on Saturday," he added.
Team news
Luciano Narsingh and Jordan Ayew are in contention to make their first Swansea starts.
Holland winger Narsingh and Ghana forward Ayew have impressed from the bench since joining in January, and Clement says the pair have also been pushing hard in training.
Jefferson Montero (hamstring), Ki Sung-yueng (knee) and long-term casualty Nathan Dyer (Achilles) remain out.
Hendrick is back for Burnley but Ashley Barnes was sent off at Hull last weekend and is suspended.
Steven Defour (hamstring) has returned to training but not ready for action, while Dean Marney and Johann Berg Gudmundsson (both knee) remain out.
Match stats
Swansea have won all three of their previous Premier League meetings with the Clarets by a 1-0 scoreline and no Premier League side has ever recorded four consecutive 1-0 victories over the same opponent.
The Swans have kept five clean sheets in their last six league games against Burnley (W5 L1), with three of those being contested in the Championship.
If Burnley win this match then they will have reached 34 points this season - already their most ever in a single Premier League campaign, surpassing their 33-point tally from 38 games in 2014-15.
Gylfi Sigurdsson has assisted five goals directly from dead ball situations this season in the Premier League; more than any other player. He has also created more chances from set-piece situations than any current Premier League player in 2016-17 (34).
Sigurdsson has attempted 28.4 per cent of Swansea's total shots in the Premier League this season (79/278) - a higher proportion than any other player for their team in the competition in 2016-17.
The Clarets have the lowest points per game ratio from away matches in the history of the Premier League (0.40), winning just 20 points from 50 Premier League away games.
Merson's prediction
Burnley have been getting better away from home. They managed to grab a point at Hull last week and it won't be long before they do win on the road.
However, Swansea are another side performing well at the moment. They have picked up back-to-back wins at the Liberty Stadium and I'm expecting them to make it three from three in front of their home fans against Burnley.
PAUL PREDICTS: 2-1 (15/2 with Sky Bet)
Betting
Swansea are Sky Bet's even-money favourites with Burnley 29/10 to register a first away win while the draw is priced at 23/10. The Swans head into the weekend as 3/1 fifth favourites for relegation with their visitors 25/1 chances to go down. Sigurdsson and Fernando Llorente share favouritism in the first goalscorer betting at 4/1 apiece while Andre Gray is considered the visitors' main threat at 7/1 to net first.
