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This Sunday marks the first Manchester derby of 2018/19, as Pep Guardiola’s reigning champions City face off with their most bitter rivals, neighbours United – still under the reins of Jose Mourinho despite a somewhat rocky start to the season.
Last season saw both teams have success in the derby; December 10th saw City defeat United 1-2 at Old Trafford, while the return fixture in April saw United pull off a stunning 2-3 victory at the Etihad – inflicting one of just two defeats all season on Guardiola’s men.
City are currently unbeaten in the Premier League and sit atop the table with 29 points, while United are 9 points behind them and are currently in 7th – but that doesn’t mean that the game won’t be a close one. With that said, I still expect City to pull off the win – and here are 3 reasons why.
#1: Pep Guardiola has a great record against Jose Mourinho
Of course, it goes without saying that on the pitch, it’s the players who have to face each other, not the managers. But one big advantage that City have over United is undoubtedly the record that their boss Pep Guardiola has against his counterpart, Jose Mourinho.
The two men have clashed numerous times in their storied careers – Guardiola has in fact faced Mourinho on 21 occasions, more than any other opponent. 11 of those matches were Spain’s famous ‘El Clasico’, with Mourinho managing Real Madrid against Pep’s Barcelona side, but they’ve also faced each other while managing Chelsea, Inter Milan, Bayern Munich and of course, the Manchester clubs.
Of those 21 games, Guardiola’s sides have come out on top on 10 occasions and have only lost on 5, giving City’s manager a big psychological advantage over his rival. In fact, it could well be argued that the 5-0 defeat that Guardiola’s Barcelona inflicted on Mourinho’s Real in 2010/11 remains the most humiliating in the Portuguese manager’s career.
Sure, that game was 8 years ago, and in England, the duo’s teams have gone 2-2-1 – but it still suggests that Pep knows how to deal with Mourinho’s teams better than most – giving City an advantage on Sunday.
#2: City’s firepower is incredible and hard to stop right now
It’s hard to bet against Manchester City right now regardless of their opponents, and most of that has to do with their ridiculous firepower. City have already scored 33 goals in their 11 Premier League games – an average of 3 per game, a record that if they keep it up, would see them finish the season with 114 goals – even beating their Premier League record of 106 from 2017/18.
That goalscoring form hasn’t just been confined to the Premier League, either – they’ve already scored 12 in the Champions League too, more than any other team in that competition.
Perhaps the most impressive thing about City’s goalscoring exploits though is the fact that so many different players have been regularly finding the net for them. Unsurprisingly, Sergio Aguero is currently their top scorer, with 10 in all competitions, but Raheem Sterling (7), David Silva (6) and Riyad Mahrez (6) aren’t far behind.
A further 9 City players have found the back of the net too, ranging from defenders like Kyle Walker to young prospects Phil Foden and Brahim Diaz. All in all, it adds up to make City an unusually dangerous side against any opponents. Essentially, even if you stop one attacking star, there’s another two or three waiting in the wings to shoot you down.
And worryingly, United have already conceded 18 goals this season – more than any other Premier League side above 15th place and 4 more than 17th placed Newcastle. Can we really expect such a leaky defence to hold fast against the striking power of Guardiola’s men? I don’t think so.
#3: United’s slow starts could prove fatal
Unusually for a Jose Mourinho side, Manchester United’s defence has looked largely unsteady for great swathes of 2018/19 thus far. As mentioned in the previous slide, they’ve already conceded 18 goals in their first 11 games – meaning they’ve let in an average of 1.6 goals per game.
It doesn’t sound like much in a way, but when clean sheets are such a key to success, it’s actually a major problem.
Probably the most worrying trend that United have seen develop this season however is their dangerously slow starts to games. United’s current record in the league is 6 wins, 2 draws and 3 losses, but it’s notable that they’ve fallen behind on 6 occasions, including in two of their victories.
Most notably, they had to dig extremely deep to beat Newcastle in October, as the Magpies went into half-time with a 2-0 lead, and they also played the majority of their 2-2 draw with Chelsea at a goal behind before Anthony Martial’s second half equaliser.
And in terms of Sunday’s game, that’s worrying for three reasons. Firstly, City are tremendous front-runners; they’ve scored 8 goals in the first 20 minutes of their league games thus far and once they take the lead, they rarely look like they’ll surrender it.
Secondly, they’ve gone behind on just 3 occasions in all competitions, and 2 of those times saw them equalise less than 15 minutes after they’d conceded – meaning only Champions League foes Lyon have managed to hold the advantage over Guardiola’s side, inflicting their only defeat upon them.
And finally, no manager can capitalise on an opponent’s weakness quite like Pep. Last season’s 3-2 victory over United saw his charges take full advantage of a notable vulnerability that the Red Devils had from set-pieces – with smaller players David Silva and Nicolas Otamendi scoring from two corners.
Assuming Guardiola has taken note of United’s tendency to start slowly this season, then we can also assume that City will look to swarm their opponents early on and put them too far behind to catch up. And undoubtedly, they’re talented enough to pull that off.
If City can score one or two early goals in Sunday’s game, then the likelihood is that the contest will be over – firmly in the favour of the side in Blue.
