City vs Everton: Preview

Everton. Bloody Everton. One of the first games I went to against Everton was the 5-1 win on the final day of the 2003/04 season, I had been confirmed on the same day and had collected a fair wedge from numerous relatives. That was a good day. Wins against Everton since however have been few and far between, and last year's win against the toffees was down much to the magic of David Silva despite Jack Rodwell's commendable effort in reeling the Spaniard in.
Once more, both Gael Clichy and Jack Rodwell will miss out tomorrow due to injury while Micah Richards has a few more weeks recovery just yet before Mancini can consider him for selection. Unfortunately, the hamstring injury that forced Milner off not long after he came on on Wednesday also rules him out of the game tomorrow.
Luckily for City, both Mirallas and Coleman will be missing for Everton for another week yet, while Neville will be missing until January. Another doubt for Everton is Leighton Baines who picked up a hamstring injury in midweek.
Garcia had a very poor game this week so he may sit this one out, forcing Yaya to drop deeper into defensive midfield, opposed to the box-to-box role he was given on Wednesday, and if fit to play, expect Nasri to come back in. City could line up as below:

Some fans might be surprised to see Balotelli there as, in truth, he wasn't great on Wednesday night but neither was Aguero for that matter, and besides, Balotelli was persistent and ended up bagging his goal, something that Kun couldn't manage during his sixty-odd minutes on the pitch, nor could he at Stamford Bridge on Sunday, where both he and Dzeko failed to turn up.

If City are to win this then they'll need huge performances from Kompany, Nastasic, Barry and Silva. Jelavic is one of the best first-time finishers in the league, if not the best, more often than not he only needs half a chance to stick the ball in the back of the net. It will be up to one of Nastasic or Kompany to limiting the Croatian to scraps in the box, something the pairing are proving they're certainly capable of doing to most Premier League strikers.
Fellaini as we all know is also a huge threat, quite literally. In terms of bringing the ball down on his chest from goal-kicks, there are few better. When John Hartson played professionally, defenders used to complain that they couldn't see around him, he was simply too big, Fellaini is very much similar to the Scotsman in the sense that he blocks opponents' views when he brings the ball down. I don't expect Barry to challenge him successfully in the air, it's up to one of our centre-halves to do that, Barry's job will be to pick up every second ball that descends from Fellaini's chest among other things.
Finally to Silva, he's looking very, very sharp again (praise the lord). His touch, his ball-retention and weight of pass have all been gold. Everton's central-midfield is quite weak in my opinion and can be very much 'got at'. If David can expose the space between the likes of Osman and Distin, of which there will be a lot, it's very much possible that our forwards could be dining well tomorrow.

We'll need to be dogged for much of the game as Everton will certainly make it extremely difficult for at least sixty-five minutes if not the whole ninety, but ultimately the game will be decided by how many of the chances that Silva and Fellaini create, will be finished off by each teams' strikers. I expect a carbon copy of the same fixture last year with City triumphing after a frustrating opening sixty-minutes, but it will be magic that decides the game, not industry.
City 2-0 Everton is on the cards again.