Last Wednesday’s mock test was…

…everything I expected in terms of how tough it would be. Despite several changes that Brighton made on the night, they impressed me a lot.

And I expect today’s real test to be much harder.

v Brighton & Hove Albion

Etihad Stadium

Predicted line-up, subs and outcome:

Number correct from the starting line-up in the last game: 9/11.

A fluid 4-2-3-1 / 4-5-1 / 4-3-3:

_____________________Haaland(VC)_________________

 

 

__Doku_________________________________Ndiaye__

 

______________________Cherki____________________

 

__________Fernandez____________Anderson_________

Gvardiol___________________________________Nunes

___________Guehi(VC)_______________Dias(C)_________

 

 

___________________Donnarumma(VC)_______________

Subs: Rulli, Ait-Nouri, Lewis, O’Reilly, Reis, Bouaddi, Kovacic, Foden and Elias.

Gianluigi returns in goal following domestic cup action; something his manager insisted would be ‘the norm’ for league games when pressed and pressed again by reporters looking for some controversy surrounding the Italian keeper.

I see a back-4 consisting of Josko, Marc, Ruben and a returning Matheus. I think we’ve missed the 28-year-old Portuguese international.

I can envisage a ‘twin pivot’ this afternoon made up of Enzo and Elliot, with Rayan-C- ahead of the pair in a free-attacking role.

Jeremy left and Iliman right, along with Cherki, will hopefully be enough to peg our opponents back a little and reduce the number of high pressing attacks.

Erling up front should help to give The Seagulls something else to think about at their end too although, should he be marked out of the game by the third-best defensive in the division, then I would hope his supporting attackers step up and contribute with on-target shots to test their keeper.

Midweek hero, Geronimo, steps back to the bench, while defensive replacement options come in the shape of wing-backs Rayan-A-, Nico and Rico and central defender, Vitor. Midfielders and wingers in ‘the 9’ are made up of Ayyoub, Mateo, Phil and Allan.

Notable absences:

-       Marcus Bettinelli – Not selected.

-       Abdukodir Khusanov – Not selected.

-       Antoine Semenyo – Out for 2 months from 17^th October with a knee injury. All being well, he could be back just in time for the busy festive period of fixtures.

Do I agree with Enzo’s (predicted) line-up?

Yes.

Result?

As I’ve mentioned, our visitors made changes in midweek and were still very impressive indeed. In fact, I thought they were the better side.

However, we made a lot of changes ourselves and although I thought that they were more dominant over the ‘90+’, we matched them in terms of goals scored and, of course as it played out, we then nudged past them on pens. Well done indeed, Geronimo Rulli, and not just for the penalty shootout but for a brilliant fingertip save before that. Good keeper.

I expect another high pace, frantic, end-to-end game today and I think there’s little doubt that there’ll be goals at both ends once again; although I expect us to be a little tighter at the back than we have been of late. Conceding 16 goals in 13 games (all competitions) is just not good enough with the personnel at our disposal and when you take into consideration also that we only leaked 2 goals in our first 6 games of the season; that level of defensive collapse since is somewhat of a concern to say the least.

However, as I say, I’m reasonably confident that my predicted set-up will be a little more solid from the midfield backwards this afternoon (3:00pm KO GMT). 🤞

Result? Most things point to a draw for me so I’m going for a points shared.

Last season’s, corresponding pre-match prediction and result:

Prediction: Win

Result: Draw

I don’t appear to have done a pre-match blog posting for that game and I made no announcement as to why. Weird… 🤷‍♂️

Expected weather conditions during the game: No breeze, no rain and sunny intervals. This is most definitely the calm after the storm(s). 13C definitely calls for a warmish coat but this is a nice Saturday afternoon for a game of footy. 🧥☕🥧🍺⚽

Solidarity

 

An opportunity and time for a little reset?

Yet another Villa Park defeat last weekend and that was largely down to deficiencies at both ends of the pitch; most notably in our defence once again. ☹️

It came against an in-form Villa side and, tonight, we face yet another team with their ‘tails up’; despite losing their last outing at the weekend.

v Brighton & Hove Albion

Etihad Stadium

With five players (Gianluigi Donnarumma, Josko Gvardiol, Ruben Dias, Elliot Anderson and Erling Haaland) being given a 3-day break following the Villa defeat, presumably from Sunday to Tuesday; there’s no way of telling if some or all of those players will appear on the bench tonight.

Following yesterday’s pre-match press conference, there was also little understanding as to whether Matheus Nunes had recovered from his recent knock / possible groin issue…unless I missed a mumbled question / answer.

Predicted line-up, subs and outcome:

Number correct from the starting line-up in the last game: 11/11.

A fluid 4-2-4-0 / 4-5-1-0:

_______________________________________________

_____________________Samba____________________

__Ait-Nouri_______________________________Elias__

 

_____________________Foden____________________

___________Kovacic_____________________________

_____________________________Bouaddi___________

 

O’Reilly___________________________________Lewis

______________Reis_____________Khusanov_______

 

 

______________________Rulli_____________________

Subs: Bettinelli, Nunes, Dias, Gvardiol, Fernandez, Cherki, Ndiaye, Doku and Haaland.

Geronimo steps in as keeper for this domestic cup competition.

I’m going for a back-4 of Nico, Vitor, Abdukodir and Rico.

Ayyoub and Mateo sit the deeper of a ‘midfield 3’ with Phil given licence to attack down the middle.

On the wings I think it’ll be Rayan-A- and Allan and we could see 17-year-old Floyd slightly advanced / working with Phil up front in a fluid 2 format.

34-year-old, Marcus, could find himself as the reserve stopper tonight; back-up defenders may come in the shape of, possibly Matheus, Ruben and Josko. Enzo and Rayan-C- are two midfielders on the bench; Iliman and Jeremy give us two wide options in ‘the 9’ and Erling might get a spot on the side as striker reinforcement.

This is a hard one to call, personnel wise, and we may well see more players brought in from our EDS than just Floyd Samba.

Notable absences:

-       Gianluigi Donnarumma – Not selected.

-       Marc Guehi - Not selected.

-       Elliot Anderson - Not selected.

-       Antoine Semenyo – Out for 2 months from 17^th October with a knee injury.

Do I agree with Enzo’s (predicted) line-up?

If fit, I would much prefer the experience and defensive competency of Nunes on the right but other than that, for this ‘Last 16’ domestic cup tie, yes.

Result?

I’ve mentioned needing a little reset and following on from that…what on earth has happened to Marc Guehi?! A player I have had so much confidence in during his time at Manchester City so far, as well as previous respect and praise for prior to his signing in January 2026.

At the moment he looks to have so many errors in him for both club and country. Of course, I’m not suggesting for one second that he’s suddenly turned into a bad player. However, there’s definitely some kind of confidence issue happening with the 26-year-old from my observations.

I also think that he’s starting to look a little exposed when up against a really pacy attacker. Is he carrying an underlying injury niggle? This was particularly noticeable against Ipswich Town, when Marc was beaten for pace twice and chose to go to ground to challenge the attacker; one time leading to a goal from open play and the other a penalty as a direct result of his desperate tackle. Last Saturday, he grabbed an attacking player whilst going to ground once again and got a yellow for his troubles; almost giving away a 32-minute penalty in the process. 🤔😕

As for Gigi Donnarumma, I’m starting to go a little cold on the 6’ 5” Italian International keeper after a decent’ish, 7/10 debut season from the 27-year-old. 🫣 For the moment at least, he’s certainly far from his often-used description as being one of the best keepers in the world.

On a final note about last weekend’s game and result I have to say, “Well done” to their keeper…and to the Aston Villa woodwork around him as well. We absolutely had our chances despite our various failings on the day.

So this Wednesday night fixture is the League Cup – often a chance for teams to rotate their squads to varying degrees and I think, in some ways after an largely excellent start to our season, we need that alternation at this moment in time.

There just happens to be a big “however”…however.

We’re facing a well-drilled and dangerous side in Brighton so I’m left with the question…can we afford too many changes if we want to attempt to win this competition whilst, at the same time, prevent our first defeat of the season turning into two, back-to-back losses?

Well, I believe that we have to give chances to the talents that are Khusanov [in his natural position], Reis and Bouaddi tonight – three players I think can step up to this challenge with the right supporting experience around them.

Step forward also 34-year-old, Argentine international, Geronimo Rulli. Bags of top-level experience there.

I’ve mentioned that our visitors are in good form but also, looking back at last season and just as was the case with Aston Villa; we also failed to beat the South Coast side both home and away last season, with a 2-1 away loss followed by a 1-1’er at our place. This is gonna be another tough one for sure.

How does our manager react following a defeat? Simply put, I don’t know because last Saturday was his first loss as Manchester City Manager and that makes it quite compelling for me.

Another important factor when deciding how this clash might play out is whether – and how much – their manager makes changes to his team. That’s something I just can’t answer.

On the one hand, he would be the first manager ever to bring a major trophy to Brighton & Hove Albion, should they progress all the way to the final and then win that 90+ minute contest. On the other hand, they’re going so well in the Premier League with 5 wins, 1 draw and 2 defeats (one of those losses being just last Sunday) that he might decide to wrap his players in cotton wool ahead of league clashes against us, once again at our place on Saturday, Brentford at home, Hull City away and a Europa Conference League trip away to Getafe in between all of those. In what order, if any, does Fabian Hurzeler place those three trophies?

Additionally, when considering tonight’s game, The Seagulls are the league’s top goalscorers (3 more than we have) and, probably a little less surprising after our defensive performances of late, have concede fewer goals too. In fact, from 8 leagues games, last Sunday saw them concede only their 6^th and 7^th league goals. 🧱

Throwing all of that up into the air to see how it lands? It’s landed on a hard-fought, perhaps narrow City win and progression to the Quarter Final stage in the third week of December…providing our visitors do make considerable changes themselves, I‘m keen to add.

Some of our fringe players need this competition to roll on a bit longer. 🤞 for both them and us.

Last season’s, corresponding pre-match prediction and result:

Prediction: N/A

Result: N/A

Expected weather conditions during the game: Finally some calm! Like so many parts of the country, many areas way worse than East Manchester, we’ve been battered by nature for a good number of days recently. After the seemingly endless storms, named or otherwise, Wednesday was a day of gentle breeze, sunny intervals and occasional showers. For the fans in the stands for the 7:30pm KO (GMT), it’ll be still, dry but a little chilly (it is a night match in October). 11C is your temperature. 🧥🧣☕🥧🍺⚽

Solidarity

 

In-form Aston Villa away is…

…sure to be a real tester. When I look back, it was exactly the case this time last year as Villa came into form…and we lost.

v Aston Villa

Villa Park

Haaland fit but we have three doubts that I’m sticking on the bench for that very reason; as they continued their recovery from various niggles and had one or two more training sessions before my blog posting release.

Predicted line-up, subs and outcome:

Number correct from the starting line-up in the last game which for me, blog wise, was our 3-2 home win against Ipswich Town: 9/11.

A fluid 4-2-3-1 / / 4-5-1 / 4-3-3:

_____________________Haaland(VC)_________________

 

 

__Doku_________________________________Ndiaye__

 

______________________Cherki____________________

__________Fernandez_____________________________

______________________________Anderson_________

 

Gvardiol________________________________Khusanov

___________Guehi(VC)_______________Dias(C)_________

 

 

___________________Donnarumma(VC)_______________

Subs: Rulli, Ait-Nouri, Lewis, Nunes, O’Reilly, Bouaddi, Kovacic, Foden and Elias.

Gianluigi in net.

With doubts surrounding both our regular left and right-wing backs, I’m guessing a starting back-4 of Josko, Marc, Ruben and Abdukodir.

Elliot to be our deepest midfielder but with Enzo not too far away and despite Foden having a blinder in midweek, I think we’ll see Rayan-C- given the ‘number 8’ role this afternoon.

Jeremy left, Iliman right and Erling up front ‘n’ centre.

Geronimo continues to provide keeper insurance; Rayan-A-, Rico, Matheus and Nico give us four defensive replacement options; albeit all flanking defenders / attacking wing-backs. Midfielders / wingers in ‘the 9’ come in the shape of Ayyoub, Mateo, Phil and Allan.

Notable absences:

-       Marcus Bettinelli – Not selected.

-       Vitor Reis – Not selected and must be rubbing his hands at our up and coming League Cup fixture; where he’ll be hoping, I’m sure, to at least get on the bench against in-form, Premier League opposition.

-       Antoine Semenyo – Out for 2 months from 17^th October with a knee injury. All being well, he’ll be back just in time for the busy festive period of fixtures.

Do I agree with Enzo’s (predicted) line-up?

Yep.

Result?

Villa Park has not been a good hunting ground for us at all in recent seasons, and our hosts’ previous seven games have seen them lift impressively - from a somewhat ropey start to their season - with 6 wins, 1 draw and 0 loses; scoring 21 and conceding 7 in all competitions. That deserves a little…“Wow” and 👏👏👏…

Scoring so many goals as they are doing versus us, a side with some question marks over our defending of late, is a cause for concern to say the least. I don’t think I’ll be alone when I say that I expect there to be goals for both sides this afternoon (12:30pm KO BST).

Points in our favour?

1.    They’re scoring lots of goals of late but we’ve been doing that all season. In fact, in the league we’ve score almost three times as many as our hosts.

2.    I’ve mentioned our issues in defence of late but of that 7-game Aston Villa run which I’ve highlighted, they’ve only kept 2 clean sheets in that time themselves. To use the words 'in fact' once again; while The Villans have conceded 11 league goals this season, we’ve only leaked 7 in 7…and 5 of those came in just two Premier League games.

3.    We’ve had an extra day to rest and prepare following both sides’ midweek international fixtures.

However, this is an early kick-off away from home at a ground where, since September 2022, we’ve managed just 1 point from a possible 12 and, as you’ll see if you read on, we’ve got the weather to battle as well as a home side backed by more than three-quarters of the (approximate) 37,000 stadium; a reduced capacity while their North Stand is under construction during the 2026-27 season.

I have been - and still am - leaning slightly towards a City win here but I’ve just swayed back a little towards a draw. I think, fellow Blues, this’ll be a ‘points shared’ outcome.

Last season’s, corresponding pre-match prediction and result:

Prediction: Win

Result: Lost

(Pre-match blog posting from that game)

Expected weather conditions during the game: Storm Boelo ensures that the day of the match will be an ‘orrible one. Hot on the heels of Storm Austen, we have more wet and windy conditions for our Midlands’ fixture. Flipping chilly too with 9C feeling more like 7C. I suppose it could be worse for fans in the stands, we could be kicking off later in the day when the rain gets heavier and the wind even stronger; although I think we’ll see some of that in the second half as it begins to ramp up for the afternoon (I hope all that construction gear inside the stadium is well secured). 🧥🧣🧤☕🥧🍺⚽

Don’t forget to change your clocks late Saturday night / early Sunday morning!

Solidarity

 

Blog announcement ahead of AEK Athens and Aston Villa.

They’ll be no pre-match blog posting ahead of our home Champions League game against AEK Athens on Tuesday night and there might also be no blog posting ahead of our away Premier League clash at Aston Villa on Saturday 24^th October.

Why?

The first is simply because of time constraints and the second would be due to a possible small holiday, which is yet to be confirmed. If I don’t go, I will put a posting one.

Definitely next up for me, blog wise, will be our home League Cup game against Brighton & Hove Albion on Wednesday 28^th October; the first of two home meetings against the in-form South Coast side in just three days (the second is on Saturday 31^st October 👻 in the league).