Huddersfield Town vs Bolton Wanderers Prediction: Charles to make former club pay

Huddersfield Town look to make it 17 unbeaten in League 1 at the John Smith's Stadium on Saturday afternoon (12:30), against managerless Bolton Wanderers, who finally pulled the plug on the Ian Evatt era after four and a half years at the north west club. 

Our very own Terrier Adam Roberts is on hand to preview this one and he's given us his Huddersfield Town vs Bolton Wanderers Prediction, as well as all the latest odds, stats and team news. 

As a Town fan living in Bolton, this fixture always carries an extra level of gravitas for myself but it looks a more intriguing one than ever taking place in West Yorkshire, early on Saturday afternoon.

It looked likely after their last league meeting, where the Terriers won 4-0 at the Toughsheet Stadium, that Evatt would be handed his P45 but he hung on for another four months, before finally being given his marching orders by chairman Sharon Brittan after a demoralising 2-1 loss at home to Charlton left them sat in ninth in the table and falling away from the playoffs.

It remains to be seen who will replace the 43-year-old at the helm permanently but they will be led on Saturday by U18s coach and former player Julian Darby, as well as academy coaches Andy Taylor and Andrew Tutte.

The atmosphere in BL6 had turned toxic in recent months and loyal fans had started to vote with their feet at home games, but they will be backed by a full contingent of 2,336 at the John Smith's tomorrow, with a much more upbeat, positive vibe among the travelling faithful.

Whether they get that much-cliched new manager bounce will depend largely on the performance of the home team, who currently possess the longest unbeaten run in the English Football League, after going 16 games unbeaten, which has seen them rise up to fourth in the table and within spitting distance of the automatic promotion positions.

Michael Duff is doing a wonderful job in Kirklees and has been backed heavily for the first time in what feels like forever by current owner Kevin Nagle, who has spent good money at this level in the January transfer window. There has also been talk this week of a huge new stadium superstore, dining and conference facilities and increased usage of the stadium for massive music events, showing the spending isn't only confined to the playing squad.

Town will be buoyed by the draw between fellow promotion hopefuls Wrexham and Birmingham City on Thursday night and face the Blues again at home on Tuesday in what could be a hugely decisive six-pointer. For that to come to fruition, however, they'll need to get past a tough and determined Trotters first.

Football Odds

Team news

Ex-Bolton striker Dion Charles will line up for a second game running along side fellow new boy Joe Taylor, who netted on his debut last week.

Elsewhere, Lasse Sorensen is fit enough for a place on the bench, but Duff is still without long-term absentees in Danny Ward, David Kasumu and Nigel Longwijk and new signing Ruben Roosken is serving the last match of his three-game suspension.

For Darby, it remains unclear what formation he will play and whether he will make significant changes from Evatt's starting XI but he will have to make late calls on defensive duo Ricardo Santos and Eoin Toal, who are both struggling with niggles.

Kyle Dempsey and Chris Forino remain out.

Huddersfield Town vs Bolton Wanderers Odds

*Please click on the link above to be taken to the main Huddersfield vs Bolton page on betfred.com (or app) for all the live betting prices on this match.

For the first time in a while Huddersfield are not odds-on at home and are priced at Evens to pick up three points, giving them an implied win probability of exactly 50%, while Bolton are the 13/5 outsiders, or a 27% chance.

The draw is also available at 13/5, with both teams to score at just 4/6 and over 2.5 goals at 4/5.

Huddersfield to win and Both teams to score @ 13/5

This has all the makings of a banana skin for the Terriers and for all the talk of their unbeaten run, they haven't been great in front of their home support recently, drawing three of their last four at the John Smith's.

However, I'm going to put all the new manager bounce mumbo-jumbo firmly in the rear-view mirror and I'm predicting Town to pick up a much-needed three points in their chase for promotion.

I've doubled it with BTTS as Bolton feature heavily in this metric at 58% and Town have seen it land in two of their last four league games.

Dion Charles to score @ 7/4

It simply had to be him didn't it?

The 29-year-old Northern Ireland international was the main man for Wanderers in recent times, scoring 41 goals over the last two seasons, but fell out of favour for one reason or another and found his chances limited this term. Despite that Charles still bagged eight goals in 16 starts this campaign before a January move across the Pennines.

A rumoured £750k fee secured the services of the prolific hit-man and while there are still questions about his chance conversion and ability to miss when it is easier to score, you can't really argue with his record at this level.

Town have been noticeably lacking in this department in past years, so the pick up of Charles and Taylor look excellent acquisitions. I'm expecting the former to score his first Huddersfield goal on Saturday before deliberately not celebrating in front of the travelling horde from Bolton.

The script is written...

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