Sivasspor vs Kayserispor

Sivasspor’s bid to avoid relegation from the Turkish Super Lig comes down to this as they welcome out-of-sorts Kayserispor at the Yeni 4 Eylül Stadyumu on the final day of the 2022/23 season.

An early opener fired Sivasspor to a narrow 1-0 home win over Konyaspor in the penultimate round, ending their underwhelming run of five defeats in six competitive outings beforehand (D1). But scoring remains a genuine issue for the ‘Braves,’ considering they’ve drawn a blank in three of their last seven matches in all competitions, netting precisely once in the other four. That said, after a 2-0 defeat in June 2020, Riza Calimbay’s men have won back-to-back H2Hs on home turf, bagging precisely two goals on both occasions. Sivas’ attacking set-up often sparks into life late in the game, as evidenced by their impressive record of finding the net beyond the 75th minute in seven of their 17 home league fixtures this season.

Picking up a much-needed point against Kayseri may not be a problem for Sivas, given that the visitors come into the final matchday on the back of three consecutive losses ‘to nil,’ two of which saw them concede multiple goals. Moreover, since a goal-glutted 4-3 win at Trabzonsopr in early April, Cagdas Atan’s men have gone winless on five successive travels in all competitions (D1, L4), with each of those four defeats yielding multi-goal margins. Since each loss also saw them concede 2+ first-half goals, seeing Kayseri behind at halftime won’t be a surprise. Such a scenario would likely put this contest beyond their reach as they’ve lost seven out of eight away league matches when trailing at the break this season (W1).