{"id":13278,"date":"2017-05-24T00:04:56","date_gmt":"2017-05-24T00:04:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/2017\/05\/24\/picking-the-best-potential-stoke-city-lineup-to-face-southampton-on-sunday\/"},"modified":"2017-05-24T00:04:56","modified_gmt":"2017-05-24T00:04:56","slug":"picking-the-best-potential-stoke-city-lineup-to-face-southampton-on-sunday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/?p=13278","title":{"rendered":"Picking the Best Potential Stoke City Lineup to Face Southampton on Sunday"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Stoke City make the trip to the south coast to face Southampton in their final game of the campaign with the hope of securing their first win in ten league games.<\/p>\n

With the Potters season petering out, Mark Hughes’s side will finish in the bottom half of the table for the first time since 2012\/13 – regardless of the result on Sunday – and as a result a few changes are expected for Sunday’s trip to St Mary’s Stadium.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Here is how Stoke City\u00a0could lineup on Sunday:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Goalkeeper<\/h2>\n
\n
    \n
  • \n
    \"Butland\"\/<\/div>\n

    Butland<\/span>1<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n

    Despite conceding eight goals in his four games since his return from a long-term injury, ?Jack Butland will start on Sunday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n

    Defence<\/h2>\n
    \n
      \n
    • \n
      \"Johnson\"\/<\/div>\n

      Johnson<\/span>8<\/span><\/li>\n

    • \n
      \"Shawcross\"\/<\/div>\n

      Shawcross<\/span>17<\/span><\/li>\n

    • \n
      \"Martins<\/div>\n

      Martins Indi<\/span>15<\/span><\/li>\n

    • \n
      \"Pieters\"\/<\/div>\n

      Pieters<\/span>3<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n

      ?Consistency in defence is key in the league and the Potters experienced\u00a0back four have played 28 times together this season – recording eight wins and 11 loses in that time – and that is not expected to change when the Potters lineup against the Saints\u00a0at St Mary’s on Sunday.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

      \n

      Midfield<\/h2>\n

      ?With\u00a0Marko Arnautovic set to miss the clash, Xherdan Shaqiri is likely to move further up the field allowing Joe Allen to take a more central role alongside Geoff Cameron and Glenn Whelan.<\/p>\n

      This midfield combination\u00a0will be instrumental in breaking up the Saints play and supplying the Potters attacking trio with quality deliveries to capitalise on the added height in the forward line.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

      \n

      Forwards<\/h2>\n
      \n
        \n
      • \n
        \"Berahino\"\/<\/div>\n

        Berahino<\/span>9<\/span><\/li>\n

      • \n
        \"Crouch\"\/<\/div>\n

        Crouch<\/span>25<\/span><\/li>\n

      • \n
        \"Shaqiri\"\/<\/div>\n

        Shaqiri<\/span>22<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n

        With goals hard to come by for Stoke – they sit fifth lowest in the league with 40 – Hughes is likely to make alterations to\u00a0the side who started against Arsenal with\u00a0Peter Crouch likely to feature from the start,\u00a0after scoring his side’s only goal against the Gunners, as he\u00a0poses an aerial threat against the Saints\u00a0defence.\u00a0<\/p>\n

        Arnautovic\u00a0is expected to miss the trip to Southampton after\u00a0suffering a suspected fracture in his right arm against the Gunners.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        Stoke City make the trip to the south coast to face Southampton in their final game of the campaign with the hope of securing their first win in ten league games. With the Potters season petering out, Mark Hughes’s side will finish in the bottom half of the table for the first time since 2012\/13 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2236,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stoke-city"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.violetsport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}