Ait-Nouri starts as Rodri misses out

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Manchester City F.C.

·22 avril 2026

Ait-Nouri starts as Rodri misses out

City make one change from Sunday's gruelling victory over Arsenal. for tonight's clash with Burnley

As expected, Rodri misses out with a groin issue, meaning Rayan Ait-Nouri earns a recall.

Vidéos OneFootball

It means a slight tactical tweak for a City side looking to climb to the Premier League summit with a victory.

Ruben Dias and Josko Gvardiol also remain sidelined with injury.

Teams

CITY: Donnarumma, Nunes, Khusanov, Guéhi, Ait-Nouri, Bernardo (C), O’Reilly, Semenyo, Cherki, Doku, Haaland

Subs: Trafford, Reijnders, Stones, Aké, Marmoush, Kovacic, Nico, Savinho, Foden

BURNLEY: Dubravka, Walker, Ekdal, Laurent, Estève, Hartman; Humphreys, Tchaouna, Ward-Prowse; Anthony, Flemming.

Subs: Weiss, Worrall, Ugochukwu, Foster, Edwards, Florentino, Pires, Broja, Tresor.

Tactics and formation

Pep Guardiola has found his most settled tam of the season and is only changing players if he is forced to.

Rodri’s absence is a blow, but the ever versatile Nico O’Reilly will take his midfield berth against the Clarets.

That means a recall for Ait-Nouri at left-back, with the Algerian looking sharp in recent weeks.

Expect O’Reilly to form a double pivot with skipper Bernardo and Rayan Cherki to take up the advanced, creative central midfield spot.

Elsewhere, it’s as you were in what looks on paper to be a 4-2-3-1 formation.

Total Focus

It was claimed In some quarters that City’s celebrations against Arsenal were over-zealous.

That has been swatted aside by Guardiola, who pointed out the magnitude of that victory and the manner it was achieved in.

With a pumped up Etihad, the players quite rightly celebrated a vital win that, had the result gone against us, would likely have ended our title challenge.

So why not enjoy the moment?

To suggest the City players and fans believed the victory over the Gunners meant winning the Premier League is a formality is ridiculous.

The moment the game was over, the focus switched to Burnley and the players were visibly calm and had their feet firmly on the ground.

We have six huge Premier League fixtures ahead of us, starting with this evening’s trip to Burnley, who will fight tooth and nail not to lose their top flight status in front of their own fans.

Winning the next game is, and was always our only focus

Every game a final

City have an opportunity to go from the hunters to the hunted if we can secure three points against Burnley.

That means a potential mentality shift for both the Blues and Arsenal.

It also means that there is no room for even a minor slip-up, and our mindset will be that the Gunners will win their remaining five games.

Pep Guardiola is spot-on when he says he and his players are not thinking about goal difference, only winning the matches in front of us.

If goal difference does come into play, it could really come to the fore if both teams are on equal points going into the final couple of games.

Winning is all that matters, because the team that finishes second could potentially have the best goal difference – but less points.

Stats and facts

Burnley have won just one of their 19 Premier League games against City (D3 L15). They’ve lost their last 11 in a row against them, their longest ever losing run against an opponent in their league history.

City have won 14 of their last 15 Premier League games against Burnley (D1) since a 1-0 loss at Turf Moor in March 2015.

City have scored 5+ goals in five different Premier League matches against Burnley – no side has done so more often against another in the competition’s history.

Burnley are winless in their last 12 home Premier League matches – only once in their league history have they had a longer league run without winning at Turf Moor, going 14 between February and October 2021.

Since the start of December, no team has won more away points in the Premier League than City (21 – W6 D3 L1), with their only defeat coming at Old Trafford versus rivals Man Utd in January.

Last season, Burnley only conceded eight home league goals, the fewest of any side in England’s top-four tiers. They have conceded 25 this season, an increase of 212.5% on last season’s tally – the biggest increase in consecutive seasons since Watford conceded 283% more goals in 2021-22 (46) than 2020-21 (12).

City are unbeaten in their last 29 Premier League matches against newly promoted teams (W26 D3) since losing 2-1 to Leeds in April 2021. Only five teams have gone 30+ games unbeaten against promoted clubs in the competition, most recently Spurs between September 2012 and November 2018 (39).

Burnley boss Scott Parker has lost all five of his Premier League matches against City by an aggregate score of 16-1, one of four teams he’s faced and lost every time along with Watford (L1), Brentford (L2) and Fulham (L2). Only Dean Smith (6) and Marco Silva (14) have faced City more often in the competition and lost each game.

Antoine Semenyo has scored in all three of his Premier League appearances against Burnley, already scoring against the Clarets for Bournemouth earlier this season. Jørgen Strand Larsen has already netted against them for two teams this season (Wolves and Crystal Palace); 2010-11 was the last time two players scored against an opponent for two different teams in the competition: Darren Bent (Sunderland, Aston Villa) and Andy Carroll (Newcastle, Liverpool) against City.

City’s Erling Haaland has scored seven goals in four appearances against Burnley in all competitions. His minutes-per-goal of one every 36 minutes against the Clarets is his second-best at City, behind his one every 26 minutes against Luton (6 goals in 158 mins).