Manchester City welcome Crystal Palace to Etihad Stadium in a tasty-looking Premier League encounter.
Victory would see Man City go top for a few hours with Arsenal not in action until teatime, whilst Palace can go as high as sixth realistically depending on results elsewhere.
Team News
Jack Grealish could return for Man City after he missed their 3-3 draw at Newcastle last weekend with a knee injury.
Kalvin Phillips (shoulder) and Luke Mbete-Tabu (concussion) are doubts following a midweek friendly draw against Barcelona in Spain.
Aymeric Laporte (knee) and Nathan Ake (groin) are ruled out.
Palace could welcome James McArthur back from a groin injury which has kept him out of their opening four matches in all competitions.
Vicente Guaita, Marc Guehi, Eberechi Eze and Wilfried Zaha feature amongst 11 players looking for a recall, after manager – Patrick Vieira made wholesale changes for their midweek win at Oxford United in Carabao Cup.
Jack Butland (hand), James Tomkins (calf) and Nathan Ferguson (foot) remain absent.
Stat Attack
- Man City have lost just one of their last five meetings against Crystal Palace (W2, D2, L1).
- Palace have claimed seven points from their last four visits to Man City’s Etihad Stadium (W2, D1, L1).
- Patrick Vieira’s Eagles are looking to keep three consecutive clean sheets against Man City for the first time in all competitions.
- Ilkay Gundogan has opened the scoring in each of Man City’s last two matches.
- Wilfried Zaha has scored three goals in Palace’s last two league matches.
Prediction
Having enjoyed a fairly solid start to the season, Man City certainly were handed a physical test at Newcastle last weekend as their defence struggled to handle Allan Saint-Maximin’s attacking pace and intensity which enabled his teammates to exploit space.
That particular difficulty however could actually stand them well if they apply those lessons here against Eze and Zaha, who are likely to cause similar issues like Saint-Maximin did last weekend.
City though can take plenty of positives from their attacking quality which remained as high as ever, but their defence is there for the taking if teams are clinical and aggressive in their attacks as Newcastle and Barcelona both demonstrated in the past week.
Palace meanwhile were initially sluggish in central defence against Aston Villa last weekend but mounted an excellent recovery with increased attacking intensity and clinical finishing, complete with stronger defending to boot plus will be refreshed after several regulars were rested in midweek.
City though won’t be a pushover for Palace who have gone well in recent visits to the Etihad so I am expecting a decent entertaining clash between two attacking teams, yet the hosts should have the edge if their defence has improved.
Prediction: Manchester City 2-1 Crystal Palace
Result: Manchester City 4-2 Crystal Palace
Leave a Reply