Rocked by a surprise defeat at Newcastle, Manchester City will be eager to bounce back against Arsenal this weekend as they look to close the five-point gap on Premier League (PL) leaders Liverpool. That defeat ended a run of eight back-to-back victories for the ‘Citizens’. Notably, it’s still six clean sheets in their previous seven competitive games.
City can proudly boast the best home record in the PL (W11, L1). A large contributor to that has been their quick starts, scoring 15% of their home league goals inside the opening 15 minutes of matches. However, impressively, they are yet to concede inside the opening 15 minutes of any league game home or away this season.
Arsenal come up against the best attack in the PL having failed to keep an away league clean sheet all season. ‘Gunners’ fans can, however, take solace knowing they’ve scored in all but one of those away games. Therefore, it is unsurprising that nine of their 11 away games have seen over 2.5 match goals.
Arsenal have lost all four of the previous competitive H2H meetings with City, with the home side winning two of those games by the same 3-0 scoreline.
Players to watch: Sergio Agüero is in the midst of another one of his fine runs of form, netting three goals in his previous three games for City.
Alexandre Lacazette scored the only goal for Arsenal the last time these sides met at the Etihad in November 2017, he also has two goals in his previous three games.
Stat attack: City were leading at half-time in 71% of their league matches.
City have scored two goals or more in each of their last 12 home matches.
Arsenal have conceded 61% of their league goals in the first half.
Arsenal have lost ‘to nil’ in three of the last four H2H meetings.
Will not play
Bravo C.
(Achilles Tendon Injury)
Bellerin H.
(Knee Injury)
Kompany V.
(Muscle Injury)
Holding R.
(Knee Injury)
Sokratis
(Ankle Injury)
Welbeck D.
(Ankle Injury)
Questionable
Mendy B.
(Knee Injury)
Maitland-Niles A.
(Knee Injury)
Mkhitaryan H.
(Ankle Injury)
Match Information
Referee: Atkinson M. (Eng),
Venue: Etihad Stadium (Manchester)