Queen’s Park Rangers v Manchester City Preview
Manchester City’s pursuit of league leaders Manchester United continues on Tuesday, as they travel to bottom of the table Queen’s Park Ranges with the intention of putting pressure on United ahead of their fixture at Old Trafford on Wednesday against Southampton. City looked pretty impressive in their victory over Stoke City at the weekend, giving a very efficient and controlled display, and nothing less than three more points will be acceptable to the visitors in this one.
While Manchester United and Robin van Persie have dominated the Premier League this season, as evidenced by United’s current five point gap at the top of the table, City are well capable of hauling them back as recent form has shown. When the reigning champions get their full compliment of players back, when Kompany returns from the short-term injury that he picked up at Stoke, when Yaya Toure arrives back in England from the African Nations Cup, when Sergio Aguero is ready to start again, then from one to eleven they still look the strongest team in the Premier League.
With United possibly still to be distracted by Champions League fixtures in the final portion of the season (although the likelihood of them being eliminated in their next tie by Real Madrid must be quite high) City could yet turn the tables on their neighbours and rivals for the second season in succession. When their entire squad is available for selection, the quality and depth of it is phenomenal, and it will be fascinating to see where Roberto Mancini looks to spend in the summer, assuming he is still the City manager by this time. One possible avenue would be to bring in a forward such as Atletico Madrid’s Falcao, and dispense with the temperamental services of Mario Balotelli.
With Vincent Kompany likely to be missing in this match, Kolo Toure on African Nations Cup duty with Cote d’Ivoire and Matija Nastasić, Maicon and Micah Richards all out from injury at present, City’s centre-back options look rather limited in this one. They may elect to play a three-man backline, made up of Zabaleta, Garcia and Lescott, with Clicy and Kolarov operating as wing-backs. In better news for the away side, Sergio Aguero may be back in the starting line-up. QPR will likely make numerous changes after their ignominious FA Cup exit; the recall of Loic Remy will be one of them.
Queen’s Park Rangers (possible 4-2-3-1): Cesar; Onuoha, Nelsen, Hill, Fabio; M'Bia, Derry; Park, Taarabt, Wright-Phillips; Remy
Manchester City (possible 3-2-3-2): Hart; Zabaleta, Garcia, Lescott; Kolarov, Clicy; Barry, Milner, Silva; Aguero, Dzeko
Betting Prediction: Although Stoke held them to a single goal in their previous fixture, City looked dangerous throughout, and they seemed to have regained their confidence and composed passing game that won them the Premier League last season. QPR conceded four to League One opposition at home last time out, and Harry Redknapp often relies on attacking play to drag one of his clubs through a crisis. So my tip for this game is for there to be more than 2.5 goals in the over / under 2.5 goals market.
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