The race for promotion in League Two heats up on Good Friday. Get ready with our Wrexham vs Mansfield prediction and preview.
Wrexham vs Mansfield Stats: Quick Hits
- Wrexham are predicted to go level on points with League Two leaders Mansfield by beating them here, with the Opta supercomputer giving them a 41.3% chance of victory.
- The Welsh side won their most recent meeting in November, knocking the Stags out of the FA Cup.
- No player has created more chances than Mansfield’s Davis Keillor-Dunn (87) in League Two this season, while he also has the fourth-most goals in the division (19).
Match Preview
Will it be a case of ‘Welcome to Wrexham’ for Mansfield Town on Good Friday? The club’s famous owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney will be hoping the visitors aren’t made too welcome in north Wales.
Both teams come into this one in the fight for the automatic promotion spots, with Mansfield topping the League Two table and Wrexham sitting three points back in third place.
Phil Parkinson’s side haven’t found League Two as comfortable as they did the National League last season, when they won a record number of points to secure the title. The Red Dragons are on course to make it back-to-back promotions, though, and could take a big step towards that with a win here.
They welcome Nigel Clough’s men to the STōK Cae Ras on Friday hoping to go level on points with them. They drew 0-0 in the reverse fixture back in October despite the Stags having 20 shots at goal.
That this game takes place on Good Friday might be a positive omen for Wrexham. They have lost just two of their last 13 Football League games played on Good Friday (W8 D3), while they also beat Mansfield the only time these two sides previously met in Wales on Good Friday, all the way back in April 1954 (2-0).
Mansfield have won each of their last two away league games played on Good Friday and will be looking to claim three such victories in succession for the first time in their EFL history.
Wrexham come into the game as favourites but they also face the only team to have scored more than their 70 goals in League Two this season with Mansfield having hit 79, as well as having conceded the fewest goals in the division (37).
As the two top scorers in England’s fourth tier, don’t be surprised to see plenty of shots, with Mansfield (703) and Wrexham (614) having attempted more than any other team, while Mansfield also have the highest expected goals (xG) total in the division (72.31).
Clough won’t need to be told that his team should keep an eye on the pair of Paul Mullin and Elliot Lee, who have 16 and 15 goals respectively this season, while only seven League Two players have created more chances than Lee’s 65.
Former Wrexham loanee Davis Keillor-Dunn will likely be the danger man for the visitors, scoring 19 goals for Mansfield this season, the fourth-most in League Two, while no-one has created more than his 87 chances in the division, recording nine assists. Only Notts County’s Macaulay Langstaff (30) has more goal involvements than Keillor-Dunn’s 28 in League Two this season.
Former Republic of Ireland international Stephen Quinn can also carve a chance out, with only Notts County’s Jodi Jones (22) on more than his 10 assists in England’s fourth tier.
Wrexham vs Mansfield Head-to-Head
These two teams met earlier this season for the first time since April 2013 when they last played against each other in the National League. They played out a 0-0 draw at the One Call Stadium in October, before Wrexham beat Mansfield 2-1 on the same ground in the FA Cup first round in November. Sam Dalby and Paul Mullin scored for the visitors, with Rhys Oates pulling one back for the Stags.
The last time Mansfield won away at Wrexham was September 2011, a 3-1 victory in the National League.
Recent Form
Wrexham have had a bit of a wobble in recent weeks, winning just three of their last eight league games (D3 L2). That includes failing to win either of their last two at home, drawing 0-0 with Harrogate Town before a 1-0 defeat at the hands of Tranmere Rovers.
They did get back to winning ways last time out though as a dominant first half against Grimsby saw Andy Cannon (2) and Mullin give them a 3-0 half-time lead. Arthur Gnahoua pulled one back for the hosts late on but Parkinson’s men ultimately won comfortably in Cleethorpes.
Mansfield haven’t done much better, winning four of their last eight games following a 9-2 thrashing of Harrogate in February (D1 L3). Their last away fixture saw them earn a 5-1 victory at Bradford City, though they followed that up with a disappointing 1-1 draw at home to relegation-threatened Colchester United last weekend.
Lewis Brunt equalised after Harry Anderson had given Colchester an early lead, but the hosts were unable to find a winner.
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off on Friday, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.
Wrexham vs Mansfield Prediction
The Opta supercomputer gives the edge to Wrexham in this one, with the Red Dragons winning 41.3% of the 10,000 pre-match simulations.
Mansfield can certainly have hope for what would be a massive three points on the road, though, winning more than a third of those simulations (33.7%), while a draw happened in almost exactly a quarter of them (25.1%).
As for season projections in League Two, both are fancied to earn promotion to League One. Mansfield are understandably the more favoured of the two as they top the league currently, and are given a 96.0% chance of going up. Wrexham have a 74.3% likelihood of doing the same and making it back-to-back promotions.
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