England Premier League
Wednesday 17th June 2020
Kick off at 8:15pm BST
Venue: Etihad Stadium
Match Preview:
99 days would have passed since the last Premier League game to the next one due to the Coronavirus pandemic but football in England’s top tier is back, albeit without fans.
That last game featured 3rd placed Leicester as they gave Aston Villa a 4-0 thrashing and in midweek back in March Manchester City and Arsenal were due to meet at the Etihad. Due to the pandemic, here we are in June ready to restart the league when we all thought back then that we would be glued to the television watching Euro 2020.
This match up of two very strong teams should be a good game despite it having to be played behind closed doors. Manchester City are 25 points behind Liverpool in 2nd place and what is interesting is that many fans from Merseyside will be taking a huge interest in this game, why? Well because of City lose then Liverpool need only to win their match at the weekend to become champions of England- the first time in 30 years, and it would be against Everton at Goodison Park, what drama could unfold.
City manager Pep Guardiola will be boosted by the fact that he has a full team to pick from on Wednesday evening. This includes the return of Leroy Sane who has missed the season with injury. Form had indeed been mixed for the champions who had lost two games from their last 4 including their last game before the virus hit and it was a 2-0 loss to rivals Manchester United.
Even though City’s chances of winning the league are next to impossible they will have to push on given that Leicester are just 4 points behind them, although City do have a game in hand.
By their standards Arsenal have been average this season and come into the game in 9th place. However under Mikel Arteta form had improved before the league had to be halted and they had gone their last five games undefeated including winning their last 3 in a row. The Gunners had scored 8 goals in those last three matches too.
Though Arsenal are 9th they are six points away from being a top 5 club so there is still a lot to play for. This match will be unique for many reasons of course as millions will be tuning in to watch. The added element is Arteta returning to the Etihad where he served of course under Guardiola, and the Spaniard will be hoping his time spent at City will have given him some inside knowledge of the squad and tactics to pass down to his players.
Team News:
Manchester City: City have no major injuries ahead of the game and will welcome back long absentee Leroy Sane back into the squad
Arsenal: Calum Chambers has been out since December with his knee but has returned to light training. As too has Lucas Torreira who had succumbed to an ankle injury
Man City vs Arsenal Head to Head:
Earlier in the season in the reverse fixture Manchester City beat Arsenal 3-0.
Manchester City have won the last 5 league meetings between the two sides.
Arsenal have not beaten City away from home in 5 years.
Manchester City have scored 11 goals past Arsenal in the last 4 league games.
Man City vs Arsenal Prediction:
In normal circumstances we could have called a home win and not thought too much about this fixture- that’s how dominant City have been over Arsenal in recent years. Of course it would make sense with the way the Gunners play, attacking and open against such quality but we need to look at Germany for perspective. That is the home advantage seems to have dissipated since the return of football with no fans. In the Bundesliga home team wins have fallen from 46% to just 18%. So will this also affect the Premier League?
Having said that the elite teams such as Bayern Munich are winning home and away with ease and Guardiola would like to think his team are in that league. As for the players though one would suspect they will be a little rusty, even some friendlies won’t quite have the players in tip top shape to play games of this nature.
Backing markets at the other end of a pandemic, well we haven’t been there before, so we must take some history of the teams, form guide and also a leap of faith. However it has helped to keep one eye on the Bundesliga and how games have been playing out there and we do believe the players will be raring to go. So whilst there will be no atmosphere, the teams will be up for this game and we expect to see a good performance from both.
The odds on a City win are around 1.30 whilst that might seem like a predictable price in normal times, this clearly isn’t normal times and the win market should be dismissed for this game.
Man City vs Arsenal Betting Tips:
Both teams to score (Yes) at 1.61
Anytime goalscorer: Raheem Sterling at 2.10
Most Booking Points: Arsenal at 1.80
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