The Eagles picked up an important win in midweek against fellow strugglers Ipswich Town which added to the welcome point against Newcastle last weekend. Now City come to town….
MATCH INFORMATION
| 7 December 2024 – 3pm |
| Selhurst Park, Holmesdale Road, SE25 6PU |
PREVIOUS MEETING
| 06/04/2024 – The last City visit saw a feast of goals at Selhurst Park with the visitors ultimately returning to Manchester with the points. The Eagles took a shock lead through Jean-Philippe Mateta before Kevin De Bruyne levelled things up. Rico Lewis gave them the lead before Erling Haaland and a De Bruyne second put the game out of reach. Odsonne Edouard scored Palace’ second late on. |
| WHO SCORED MAN OF THE MATCH – Kevin De Bruyne (9.9) |
MATCH OFFICIALS
| Referee | Rob Jones |
| Assistant | Ian Hussin |
| Assistant | Neil Davies |
| Fourth Official | Sam Barrott |
| VAR | Stuart Attwell |
| Assistant VAR | Adrian Holmes |
TEAM NEWS
PALACE – Chadi Riad is close to a return while Matheus Franca, Adam Wharton, and Rob Holding continue to miss out. Daichi Kamada returns from a three match ban.
CITY – Rodri, Oscar Bob, and Mateo Kovacic are unavailable while John Stones, Manuel Akanji, Phil Foden, and Nathan Ake will be assessed ahead of the game.
DISCIPLINARY RECORD
This is the section of our match preview that highlights those that have not been the best of friends with match officials as the season goes on. Of course, they all begin with a clean slate, but we will start to see those that will be heading for a ban or two as the campaign progresses.
| RED CARDS – Daichi Kamada (1) |
| YELLOW CARDS (over 3.5) – Will Hughes (6), Daniel Munoz (4), Jefferson Lerma (4), Bernardo Silva (4) |
FORM GUIDE
Last FIVE meetings between the two sides;
| 06/04/2024 | Palace 2-4 City |
| 16/12/2023 | City 2-2 Palace |
| 11/03/2023 | Palace 0-1 City |
| 27/08/2022 | City 4-2 Palace |
| 14/03/2022 | Palace 0-0 City |
Last FIVE results for Palace:
| 03/12/2024 | Ipswich 0-1 Palace |
| 30/112024 | Palace 1-1 Newcastle |
| 23/11/2024 | Villa 2-2 Palace |
| 09/11/2024 | Palace 0-2 Fulham |
| 02/11/2024 | Wolves 2-2 Palace |
Last FIVE results for City;
| 04/12/2024 | City 3-0 Forest |
| 01/12/2024 | Liverpool 2-0 City |
| 26/11/2024 | City 3-3 Feyenoord |
| 23/11/2024 | City 0-4 Spurs |
| 09/11/2024 | Brighton 2-1 City |
LEAGUE POSITION
Heading into the fixture, Palace are 17th in the Premier League with 12 points from 14 games played, while City are 4th with 26 points from the same games played.
RECORD AGAINST CITY
| Played | 71 |
| Won | 17 |
| Drawn | 16 |
| Lost | 38 |
FORM PLAYERS ACCORDING TO WHO SCORED
This is the section of our match preview where we list two players from each side that are top of the ratings by our friends over at Who Scored. Obviously, there are no ratings to share at the moment but that will soon change!
| Erling Haaland | 7.43 |
| Kevin De Bruyne | 7.28 |
| Ebere Eze | 7.02 |
| Daniel Munoz | 6.92 |
ONE TO WATCH
| SAVINHO |
| FORMER CLUBS – Atletico Mineiro, Troyes, Jong PSV (loan), PSV (loan), Girona (loan) |
| The Brazilian winger his shown glimpses of his talent since his summer move to the Etihad for a fee in the region of £30million, but he looks to still be acclimatising to the Premier League. |
KEY CLASH
| MAX LACROIX v ERLING HAALAND |
| The French defender has really impressed in his first season at the club, more so since Oliver Glasner moved him into the centre of the back three. He will be truly tested this weekend by coming face to face with a certain prolific Norwegian striker that has taken the Premier League by storm since he arrived. |
THE NUMBERS
Palace’s only win in the past 11 meetings was by 2-0 at Etihad Stadium in October 2021.
City are unbeaten in 10 matches in all competitions at Selhurst Park since a 2-1 league defeat in September 2015 (W8, D2).
The Eagles are vying to win back-to-back top-flight games for the first time since ending last season with a run of three victories.
They are also aiming for consecutive clean sheets in the league for the first time since a sequence of three shut-outs in September and October 2023.
Palace have not scored or conceded more than two goals in any Premier League fixture this season.
The Londoners won 5 of 7 league matches at Selhurst Park under Oliver Glasner in 2023-24 but have just one victory from seven top-flight home fixtures this season (D3, L3), scoring a league-low four goals.
Jean-Philippe Mateta has scored 14 goals in 14 home league games under Glasner.
Mateta is vying to become the second player to score in three consecutive league appearances against Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City, emulating Mohamed Salah between 2020 and 2021.
Each of Eberechi Eze’s last five Premier League assists have been for Mateta.
Dean Henderson is one short of 100 Premier League appearances
PRE-MATCH STATS
This is the section of our match preview where we keep a tally on the statistics for Palace players as the campaign continues and how they compare to other Premier League players.
| Goals | Jean-Philippe MATETA 4 (23rd) |
| Assists | Ebere EZE 2 (34th) |
| Passes | Marc GUEHI 751 (20th) |
| Tackles | Daniel MUNOZ 52 (1st) |
| Touches | Marc GUEHI 949 (19th) |
| Shots | Ebere EZE 40 (7th) |
| Fouls | Daniel MUNOZ, Will HUGHES 21 (16th) |
| Dispossessed | Ebere EZE, Ismaila SARR 18 (31st) |
| Saves | Dean HENDERSON 44 (6th) |
| Clearances | Marc GUEHI 75 (5th) |
| Big Chances Missed | Jean-Philippe MATETA 8 (6th) |
TEB PREDICTION
It would be foolish to think that the recent poor form of the defending champions will continue for much longer, particularly as they ended their run of games without a win against Forest in midweek. Having said that, Palace have been a tough team to beat this season and have the benefit of the injury room starting to clear of bodies. We expect a tight game and the Eagles could take something from it but City will likely just edge it.
| PREDICTED SCORE: 2-1 City |
