Swansea City will be facing the Etihad outfit twice in a matter of days as they get ready to avenge their EFL Cup loss against them. Swansea ended up 1-2 losers after Manchester City turned on the style in the second half. They were up against a much changed City line-up who had made 9 alterations to the team who had turned up against Bournemouth last week. Swansea are under considerable pressure having gathered 4 points from a possible 15 till now.
Francesco Guidolin broke the club transfer record as he got Borja Baston to lead the line after letting all his strikers leave. He also signed Fernando Llorente and the Spaniard will be expected to deliver the goods as the season progresses. They had started off on a positive note with a win against Burnley before succumbing to consecutive losses against Leicester City and Hull City. They managed a fortuitous draw against Chelsea, which was expected to give them the requisite momentum to kick on from there. But a 1-0 loss against Southampton left them facing two matches against the marauding Manchester City in the space of four days, praying for any point that they can muster.
Francesco Guidolin will not be panicking just yet, but he needs a couple of wins under the belt to lift the atmosphere which can quickly go down in the dumps with a couple of more losses.
T4O’s PREDICTED SWANSEA CITY LINE-UP VS MANCHESTER CITY (4-2-3-1)
DEFENCE
Fabianski will make a comeback between the sticks and will be expecting a busy day in the office with the City bigwigs expected to make a comeback. Kyle Naughton will be at right-back with a centre-back pairing consisting most probably of Federico Fernandez and Jordi Amat. They have to contend with the returning Sergio Aguero who will be raring to make up for the lost games. Kingsley seems to have moved ahead of Neil Taylor in the pecking order and will line-up at left-back.
MIDFIELD
Jack Cork and the impressive Leroy Fer will be stationed in midfield with Fer being the surprise top scorer of the Swansea team. His physical presence in the midfield will be vital to neutralize City’s domination in the centre of the park. Ki Sung-Yeung will be in the No.10 role and his composure will be required when faced with goal scoring chances which are expected to be few and far between.
ATTACK
Barrow and Sigurdsson are expected to take up the other two spots in an attacking 3 with Fernando Llorente most likely to get the nod. Borja Baston worked his socks off in midweek and might start from the bench.
