Aston Villa meet Manchester City at Villa Park in a blockbuster clash in the Premier League title race.
Victory could see Aston Villa go second if Liverpool lose elsewhere or draw but Villa win by six or more goals.
Man City meanwhile can go top if Arsenal and Liverpool both lose elsewhere.
Team News
Boubacar Kamara will return for Aston Villa after he was suspended for their 2-2 draw at Bournemouth.
Tyrone Mings (knee), Bertrand Traore (muscle) and Emiliano Buendia (ACL) remain ruled out.
Man City will be without Rodri and Jack Grealish after the pair collected their fifth bookings of the league campaign in their 3-3 draw against Tottenham.
Jeremy Doku (unspecified) is a doubt but Matheus Nunes (muscle) and Kevin De Bruyne (hamstring) remain absent.
When is Kick-Off?
Aston Villa host Man City in a 8:15pm GMT kick-off at Villa Park on Wednesday 6 December, live on Amazon Prime in the UK.
Stat Attack
- Aston Villa are winless in their last 13 league meetings against Man City (D2, L11).
- Man City are unbeaten in their last six visits to Aston Villa (W4, D2).
- Both teams have scored in their last five league meetings, with Villa netting six goals to Man City’s 11 goals.
- Only one of Ollie Watkins’ eight league goals for Villa this season has been scored from a header.
- Three of Erling Haaland’s 14 league goals this season have been scored from headers.
Prediction
With just one point separating both teams coming into this game, Villa and Man City both know that a defeat would dent their title aspirations.
Villa though have a 100% league record at home this season but they certainly can’t afford to start each half as sloppy as they did at Bournemouth, yet they showed that they don’t know when they are beaten and victory would certainly fuel talk of a title tilt.
Man City meanwhile will be slightly weaker in midfield with Rodri and Grealish ruled out and Doku doubtful, but they nevertheless will still be strong as usual especially if can produce an attacking press as dominant as they did against Tottenham.
City’s defence however were poor with three individual pieces of poor marking clinically punished and if they play like that here, they might again not be too lucky so there is clearly work to be done for a team with just two clean sheets in nine matches.
Goals therefore do feel guranteed but if City can’t sort out their leaky defence against a dangerous Villa attack who are in excellent home form, I can see Villa springing a surprise but a draw might just be the likely outcome.
Prediction: Aston Villa 1-1 Manchester City
Result: Aston Villa 1-0 Manchester City
Leave a Reply