St. Johnstone v Dundee FC: draws at home, wins on the road
St. Johnstone host Dundee FC at McDiarmid Park after a run of draws, while the visitors arrive with three wins from five. Form, shared opponents and member predictions.
By Harvey Watkins,
The most telling comparison ahead of Saturday's game at McDiarmid Park comes from three clubs both sides have faced recently. Against Kilmarnock, Motherwell and Rangers, Dundee FC took two wins and a draw, scoring seven and conceding four. St. Johnstone faced the same three and came away with two draws and a defeat, scoring four and conceding eight. On that narrow measure, the visitors have been the sharper side.
There is an important caveat. All three of those Dundee FC results came at home. St. Johnstone played two of theirs away, including a 4-0 defeat at Rangers that accounts for half the goals they conceded in that sample. The gap is real, but it is not quite as wide as the raw figures make it look.
St. Johnstone's recent form
St. Johnstone have one win, three draws and one defeat from their last five, with six goals scored and nine conceded. The sequence reads draw, draw, defeat, draw, win, from most recent to oldest. Their only clean sheet came in that win, a 1-0 at Aberdeen on 11 October.
Since then the pattern has been draws. A 1-1 at home to Dundee United was followed by the heavy loss at Rangers, then back-to-back 2-2 results against Motherwell at home and Kilmarnock away. They have been scoring in those games but not keeping goals out, and they have not won in four.
Dundee FC's recent form
Dundee FC have three wins, a draw and a defeat from their last five, with ten goals scored and seven conceded. Their most recent outing was a 3-1 home win over Kilmarnock on 28 October. Before that they lost 2-1 at St. Mirren, drew 2-2 at home to Rangers, won 2-1 at Falkirk and beat Motherwell 2-1 at home.
They have scored in every one of those matches, but they have also conceded in every one. They have kept no clean sheets in their last five. Their away record within that run is one win at Falkirk and one defeat at St. Mirren, which is a small sample to judge them on the road.
The previous meeting
The sides met on 2 September when Dundee FC hosted St. Johnstone, and it finished 1-1. That is the only recent meeting, so it tells us little beyond the fact that there was nothing between them on that occasion.
What PLZ members are predicting
Twenty-three PLZ Soccer members have entered this fixture in the PLZ Predictor. Of those, 48 per cent have gone for an away win, 39 per cent for a draw and 13 per cent for a home win. The most commonly predicted scoreline is 1-2, chosen by 11 members. These are our members' calls, not odds, and they are shared here for interest rather than as evidence about either team.
The assessment
Dundee FC come in with the better recent record and the stronger results against shared opponents. St. Johnstone are at home, have been hard to beat outside the trip to Rangers, and have scored twice in each of their last two games.
Neither side has been keeping goals out with any consistency, which points towards both teams scoring. St. Johnstone's habit of drawing, and the 1-1 in September, mean a share of the points would not be a surprise. My view is that Dundee FC's form edges it, but the margin in the evidence is slim, and much of their advantage was built at home rather than away.