Manchester City keep their treble hopes alive this weekend with a trip to the Turf Moor to take on Burnley FC. With Liverpool predictably routing Huddersfield Town tonight, the Reds went back a top of the table with 91 points. However, Sunday’s match will be the 36th for City, pulling them even with Liverpool.
Should City achieve the road win, they’ll be one point ahead of the Merseyside club with just two games and six possible points left for the two Premier League title contenders. At this point, every match is do-or-die elimination, so let’s take a look at this fitness situation for this massive clash.
For the hosts, they have three long term injury absentees who will be missing for this one: Peter Crouch, Steven Defour and Aaron Lennon. Additionally, Phillip Bardsley is dealing with a gashed leg that has kept him out of the last three games and he’s a doubt for this match.
Flipping over to the visitors, back-up goalkeeper Claudio Bravo remains a long term absentee while big Belgian midfield maestro Kevin De Bruyne is out with a muscular injury that may keep him from appearing again this season. Meanwhile midfielders Fernandinho (knee issue) and Ilkay Gundogan (a knock) got hurt in Wednesday’s 2-0 Manchester derby win.
City are hoping that both will be fit in time for this clash.
Manchester City at Burnley FC FYIs
Kickoff- Sunday Apr 28, Turf Moor 2:05pm
Manchester City Starting XI Prediction: go to this link
Referee: Paul Tierney
Form Guide: Burnley DWWWL Manchester City WWWWW
Google Result Probability: Manchester City win 83%, Draw 12%, Burnley win 14%
Prediction- Manchester City 4, Burnley 0
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, regularly appears as a guest pundit on WGN CLTV and co-hosts the “Let’s Get Weird, Sports” podcast on SB Nation.
He also contributes sociopolitical essays to Chicago Now. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram. The content of his cat’s Instagram account is unquestionably superior to his.