Cardinals vs. Saints: time, how to watch, live stream, key matches and “Friday Night Football” selection

For Thursday’s edition of Football this week, we have two NFC teams on a disappointing 2-4 start.

The Arizona Cardinals play host to New Orleans Saints In the seventh week, as Kyler Murray and Co. To get themselves back on track now that star-level receiver DeAndre Hopkins is set to return. Saints Andy Dalton will start quarterback for this competition, and they are dealing with a massive number of injuries at the moment. Will they be able to overcome or will they surrender?

Which of these two teams will fall back into the .500 game, and which will falter the most in the rankings? We’ll find out soon enough. Meanwhile, here’s how to watch the game Thursday night.

how to watch

Date: Thursday, October 20 | time: 8:20 PM ET
Site: State Farm Stadium (Glendale, Arizona)
Stream: Amazon Prime Video
Follow: CBS Sports . app
Prospect: Cardinals-2, O/U 44 (courtesy of Caesars Sportsbook)

When the saints have the ball

The name of the game here injuries. The Saints will be without wide receivers Michael Thomas and Jarvis Landry, court finisher Adam Trautman, and guard Andrews Pete, and that’s in addition to Deont Harty joining Trevor Benning in the injured reserve.

Dennis Allen waited until late Thursday afternoon to name the quarterback after he said on Wednesday that It will be game time decision. The expectation is that Dalton will be below the center.

We know Alvin Camara is going to be pretty involved. We know that Mark Ingram II will mingle on Earth. We know that Chris Olaf, expected to return from the concussion that kept him out of the Week 6 game for New Orleans, will get all the work he can do in a passing game. Beyond that, however, it’s anyone’s guess – at least from the saints’ perspective.

But we also know that the Cardinals’ defense was vulnerable to just about everything they threw opposing fouls at them, but especially on the pass. The Cardinal ranks 24th in DVOA passing defense in Football Outsiders, 28th in midfield throws, 29th in short passes, and 32nd in passes to fullbacks. All of which points to the potential for a big receiving game for Camara, who has netted six goals in each of his last two competitions after scoring just five in his first two games combined.

When the Cardinals get the ball

Arizona crime is in flux right now.

Marquis Brown has been Keeler Murray’s number one target this season, but is now out for a long time after sustaining a foot injury in a pointless play in last week’s game. Rodney Hudson left center and guard Justin Pugh is now in injured reserve. James Conner is listed as questionable but hasn’t trained all week, and Daryl Williams is out.

DeAndre Hopkins is back from suspension but has also not been at the facility since pre-season. The Cardinals traded for Robbie Anderson earlier this week, but he is unlikely to be fully aware of the attack just yet. It looks like Eno Benjamin will lead the field again, and Rondell Moore and Zach Ertes will be heavily involved as short-term targets for Murray – who may need to target those areas more often due to various problems along the offensive line.

The Cardinals have been a huge disappointment with the attack so far this season. Some of this is attributed to Hopkins’ absence. Some of them are due to injuries sustained by the team. But a lot boils down to the team’s offensive plan, which either doesn’t exist or simply “Kyler, go do something” a lot. Kliff Kingsbury has shown in the past the ability to plan his way into an effective running game by spreading out the field and getting his backs to the north and south, but even that hasn’t happened this year. Meanwhile, the pass game has been out of the game all year. Except for the plays where Murray makes magic, things have been ugly.

The New Orleans defense wasn’t as frustrating as the Arizona offensive, but it certainly didn’t live up to high expectations. The Saints are only ranked 18th in defensive DVOA, 21st against passing and 14th against running. It’s 19 yards per game, 20 yards per lead, and 15 in EPA per game. This team needs defense to be an elite unit, and it’s been just average so far.

The loss of Marcus Williams in the back end didn’t help, but that’s also just an old unit now. Players like Cameron Jordan, Demario Davis, Tiran Mathieu and others are still rookies, but not quite as good as they have been in recent seasons. (And Matthew was not so good at times this year.) That little bit of slip is important when the margin of error is as small as it is for Saints today. They will have to increase their pressing rate against Murray while also not allowing him to break containment to have a defensive success in this match.

Prediction: Cardinals 23, Saints 17