Dias starts at Ipswich as City make four changes | OneFootball

Ruben Dias' return is one of four changes to City's starting lineup for this afternoon's Premier League clash at Ipswich Town.

The Portuguese defender last played on the 15 December and has been unavailable through injury for our last seven matches.

He is joined in the XI by Ederson, Ilkay Gundogan and Jeremy Doku, who all began Tuesday's draw at Brentford on the bench.

Stefan Ortega Moreno, Bernardo Silva and Savinho drop to the bench while Nathan Ake is injured for this one.

Erling Haaland's hat-trick in the reverse fixture back in August helped us to a 4-1 win over the newly promoted side.

This is our first league trip to Portman Road since a 2-1 defeat in the penultimate fixture of the 2000/01 season - sealing our last relegation from the Premier League.

Teams

CITY XI: Ederson, Nunes, Akanji, Dias, Gvardiol, Kovacic, Gundogan, De Bruyne (C), Foden, Doku, Haaland

Subs: Ortega Moreno, Grealish, Bernardo, Savinho, Mubama, Alleyne, O'Reilly, Lewis, McAtee

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Tactics

Ederson, in his first Premier League game since our derby defeat to Manchester United, will be protected by a defence of Matheus Nunes, Manuel Akanji, Ruben Dias and Josko Gvardiol. Nunes and Gvardiol will, of course, progress up the pitch when we have the ball.

Mateo Kovacic and Ilkay Gundogan will hold fort in central midfield, allowing Kevin De Bruyne, Phil Foden and Jeremy Doku to interchange behind striker Erling Haaland.

WATCH: Watch: City’s memorable moments at Ipswich

Match stats

Ipswich have lost just one of their last 28 home league games against City (W20 D7), winning the last four in a row. This is the first such meeting however since May 2001.

In what is the 30th different league campaign in which we’ve met, we are looking to complete the double over Ipswich for just the third time, previously doing so in 1961-62 and 1994-95.

We have won 20 of their last 21 Premier League games against promoted sides since losing 2-1 to Leeds United in April 2021, with the only exception in this run being a 1-1 draw at Nottingham Forest in February 2023.

Over their last two Premier League campaigns (2001-02 and this one), Ipswich have won just one of their 14 games played on a Sunday (D6 L7), winning 2-1 at Spurs earlier this season.

We have dropped 14 points from winning positions in the Premier League this season, letting a 2-0 lead slip to draw 2-2 with Brentford last time out. It’s the most points we have dropped from ahead in a single campaign since 2008-09 (20).

Erling Haaland scored a hat-trick in City’s 4-1 win against Ipswich earlier this season – the only player to score home and away hat-tricks against an opponent in the same campaign is Emmanuel Adebayor (for Arsenal vs Derby County in 2007-08).

Having failed to score in his first 11 Premier League games this season, Phil Foden has netted four goals in his last five. He’s looking to score in three consecutive league games for the first time since October 2022.