Manchester City vs Juventus preview: Match time, live telecast, prediction

The last time the two sides played each other former Juventus man Carlos Tevez played for Manchester City

The finalists of last season’s Champions League competition have a difficult start to the latest edition as they head to England to take on the current leaders of the Premier League Manchester City. The Italians will be wary of the good form that Manuel Pellegrini's side have shown in the 5 league games so far in contrast to their own dismal showing.

Team News

The English team’s Chilean boss confirmed in his pre-match conference that the talismanic striker Sergio Aguero will not feature for the Citizens when they host the Italian champions. But there is good news too for the team as David Silva and Raheem Sterling who were missing on the weekend are once again in contention for starting places.

Max Allegri has loads on his plate to worry about given that Juve are presently experiencing their worst start to a season in their 118-year history. The injury to Claudio Marchisio in the draw against Chievo is only the latest in that list. The Italian midfielder joins summer recruit Sami Khedira on list as the German is currently recovering from a thigh injury.

The relatively promising performances of Chelsea loanee Juan Cuadrado and former Inter Milan man Hernanes gives the flying Donkeys a few more options as Allegri ponders his strategy for the game.

Live Telecast

The game will kick off at 00:15 IST (19:45 BST) at Old Trafford. The live telecast will be available on Ten Action in India.

Team Form

Manchester City have ruled the roost in their Premier League outings so far scoring 12 times and conceding none. Their game over the weekend was the closest they came to dropping points so far before youngster Kelechi Iheanacho turned up in the right place at the right time to hand them the win.

The defending Italian champions have had a completely opposite start to their season, after losing their first 2 games against Lazio and Roma respectively, and they followed it up with a draw against Chievo to register a lone point in 3 games. Allegri’s men have only managed 2 goals so far while conceding 4.

All games so far:

Manchester City- WWWWW (Last Match: Crystal Palace 0-1 Manchester City)

Juventus – LLD (Last Match: Juventus 1-1 Chievo)

Head-to-head and Key Stats

The two teams have only faced each other 4 times over 2 ties in their history and only once in the Champions League era. In the 2010-11 season they were placed in the same Europa league group and both their ties ended 1-1. The earlier tie was in the UEFA Cup (1976) when Juventus won 2-0 at home and Manchester City won the return fixture 1-0 and were eliminated on aggregate. That makes the overview 2 draws and 1 win for each team but it’s not much to go by.

Manchester City have not won against Juventus the last 3 times they met in European competitions (D2 L1).

Juventus have failed to win against a team from Manchester on the last 6 occasions (D3 L3).

Juventus are a part of the Champions League for the 16^th time as compared to Manchester City’s 5^th campaign in the competition during which they have never gone past the round of 16 stage.

Manchester City have played 28 games in the Champions League so far and none of them have ended goalless.

Prediction

The English side may struggle to cope on a European night once against especially without their Argentine hitman, but given their great form and Juve’s poor start, it might just play out in favour of the home side. It seems more ominous when you consider that the Citizens have not conceded so far and Juve look far from a side that threaten that record right now. Add to the mix, the fact that the sides are playing at the Etihad and it begins to appear that City could walk away with a win.

Manchester City 2-0 Juventus