Chelsea vs Mancity-Pre-match Briefing

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The reverse match this season
21 September 2014 Barclays Premier League
Man City..……..….…..1 Chelsea………..……1
Lampard 85 Schurrle 71

Att: 45,602
Chelsea v Manchester City in all competitions
Games played 151
Chelsea wins 63
City wins 50
Draws 38
Head to head in the League at Stamford Bridge
Games played 69
Chelsea wins 35
City wins 13
Draws 21
Biggest league win at Stamford Bridge for each team
27/10/2007 - Chelsea 6-0 Manchester City
16/09/1978 - Chelsea 1-4 Manchester City

TACTICAL BRIEF
This match, featuring England's finest home side and the best team on the road, is the leaders' first league action since the 5-0 away thrashing of Swansea, and a resumption of the title chase for Manchester City after their 2-0 stumble at the Etihad against Arsenal.

Chelsea have won four of the last eight league games against City and share with the Gunners the distinction of beating the Mancunians the most times in the Premier League era.
Jose Mourinhohas the edge in wins over Manuel Pellegrini too, with seven victories in 11 matches compared to the Chilean's two. The Special One made nine changes to his side for the second successive game in midweek and ingenuity will again be required of both bosses as they pick their 11 for Saturday's showdown.
Yaya Toure's presence in Equatorial Africa rather than east Manchester these past weeks has been sorely felt, with no win in three games. (Had this campaign started at the halfway mark, City would now be 12th.) Toure and new £28m-signing from Swansea, Wilfried Bony, still have Africa Cup of Nations engagements to fulfil until Sunday at least.

Without Toure, Pellegrini has been fielding both Fernando and Fernandinho, a powerful pairing but lacking his unique skill-set, in the central midfield area. On occasion he has used Frank Lampard there, but more usually the former Blue has been summoned from the bench to play upfront and poach a goal, as he did to level the score against his old club earlier this season.
Pellegrini preferred a more-or-less 4-4-2 formation back then, but has since set his side out in a 4-2-3-1 and stuck with it.

He has additional injury worries this weekend. Mangala, who has struggled on occasion this season, may miss this game with a groin strain, meaning Martin Demichelis (pictured below left) will most likely partner Vincent Kompany at the heart of defence. A calf strain may also rule out attacking midfielder Samir Nasri and centre-forward Edin Dzeko is recovering from the same problem.
Kompany suffered lapses in some of those faltering recent games that were uncharacteristic by his own high standards. Further forward City have worked hard but against Arsenal lacked the spark of creativity and could not find the space to summon their usual forcefulness to carve out chances.
The defending champions often have long spells within matches when they concede possession, but they have generally found the decisive moments to earn a result.

A number of individuals can create a goal from nothing in the blink of an eye, including the elusive David Silva and Sergio Aguero. However both seem to thrive in the other's absence as they often take up similar positions on the pitch.
Silva's best performance of the season was on Boxing Day at West Bromwich Albion, where he played centrally behind 'false no.9' James Milner and was flanked by Nasri and less-effective winger Jesus Navas. Milner was very impressive in a number of positions in our earlier meeting.

With Aguero back in the side and working his way back to full sharpness, the Spaniard has been less influential. In fact, the Citizens hit nine goals over the festive period without their strikers but have managed none in their last two with Aguero or Jovetic reinstated.
The Argentinean's strike-rate against the Blues of five goals in 10 matches for City and Atletico means no one will be ignoring his prowess. Should the calf injury suffered in midweek prevent Filipe Luis from playing there is an equally able replacement in Cesar Azpilicueta, who often thrives in big matches.

An intriguing call for Chelsea will be in central defence, where Kurt Zouma, who again acquitted himself very well against Liverpool, could retain his place over the vastly more experienced Gary Cahill.
The suspension of prolific Diego Costa, another former Atletico star, means Mourinho must decide whether to replace the Spain striker with Loic Remy or Didier Drogba. Or he could even decide to wrong-foot his opposite number by playing an attacking midfielder there, such as Eden Hazard – so wonderful to watch again in midweek against Liverpool – or Oscar, who has scored or made five goals in three league matches.
Our manager will want his four main offensive players to be at their sharpest and most decisive against the City back four and goalkeeper. They have at times been less able than the Blues to recover from errors and deny the opponent a goal.
Their record of seven clean sheets this campaign matches Sunderland and Aston Villa. Almost two-thirds of the goals they concede come in the second half.

Set-plays are often the decisive factor in top-of-the-table clashes between well-matched sides. Chelsea have scored four times as many goals from corners (eight) as the visitors and return to the Bridge having won the semi-final against Liverpool by that route. Goalscorer Branislav Ivanovic has set up a goal in each of his last three league outings.

The Chelsea manager said Cesc Fabregas was withdrawn during the Liverpool game before suffering a proper hamstring injury and Chelsea always look better for the midfielder's inventiveness, especially around the edge of the box. Fabregas has set up 15 goals in 21 games this season, the fastest to that total since Opta started recording assists.

City commit one-and-a-half more fouls per game than Chelsea, who are the victims of an average three more infringements over 90 minutes.
They have been treated more leniently in terms of fouls conceded before a yellow card is brandished, and when they are cautioned it is half as likely again to be for a bad tackle in comparison to Mourinho's men.
As they have shown in our recent meetings, the Mancunians are not averse to sharing around the team the burden of thwarting the likes of Hazard and Oscar by any means necessary.

Hazard, the most kicked player in the Premier League, was fouled four times at the Etihad, three of them when he was about to break through into the box. The physical aspect of these encounters is one reason Mourinho may turn again to the battling Ramires, who looked back to his best against Liverpool.

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