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Manchester Evening News
Manchester Evening News
Sport
Alex Brotherton & Simon Bajkowski

How Man City should line up vs Crystal Palace

Manchester City will take on Crystal Palace at the Etihad Stadium on Saturday afternoon, hoping to continue their undefeated start to the new season.

The Blues dropped points for the first time this term in a 3-3 draw at Newcastle last weekend, but returning to winning ways will be no easy task against Patrick Vieira's Palace.

The London side have become something of a bogey team for City in recent years, losing just one of their last four league meetings with Pep Guardiola's side. In this fixture last season, City lost 2-0.

Guardiola will be looking to avoid a repeat of that, although there are question marks surrounding the availability of some of his players.

READ MORE: Pep Guardiola says that Bernardo Silva will stay at City this summer

Aymeric Laporte continues to recover from knee surgery, and Guardiola was unsure whether Nathan Ake and Jack Grealish - who both missed the midweek trip to Barcelona - would be fit enough to feature.

Below, our City writers have picked who they think should start for City. You pick your own starting XI using the team selector widget at the bottom of the article.

Simon Bajkowski

City only have two fit centre-backs and the full-backs are automatic picks as long as they are fit, although Sergio Gomez did look good in the opening 45 minutes at Barcelona. While it got overrun at Newcastle, the midfield trio that have started the season so well deserve to carry on.

Bernardo Silva had a hand in two goals so should keep his place, but I would move him over to the left wing with Phil Foden having struggled to get into games and Jack Grealish likely absent with injury. Riyad Mahrez has had to be patient for opportunities but could do with coming in and starting a game.

Julian Alvarez looked good against Barcelona and should get more minutes against Palace and Forest than he has so far, but Haaland is still the man to start on Saturday.

Alex Brotherton

The defence pretty much picks itself really, with Ake a doubt after limping off against Newcastle last weekend and Laporte still unavailable.

On Friday Guardiola spoke about the counter-attacking threat that Palace carry and how good they are in midfield, so Bernardo Silva may get the nod over Ilkay Gundogan as he gives more cover defensively and can sit deep alongside Rodri if need be.

It could be the type of game where Guardiola wants City to keep a foot on the ball rather than every attack being direct and fast, primarily to avoid an end-to-end basketball game like we saw in Newcastle. Ideally he'd like to start Grealish, but his injury issues make it likely that Foden starts on the left wing and Riyad Mahrez on the right.

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