Rúben Dias, Joško Gvardiol and Jérémy Doku all come into the starting XI, with Matheus Nunes, Nico O’Reilly and Phil Foden moving to the bench.
TEAMS
FOREST: Sels, Murillo, Milenkovic, Jair Cunha, Williams, Schlager, McAtee, Munoz, Yates, Gibbs-White, Delap
SUBS: John Victor, Diomande, Sangare, Hudson-Odoi, Wood, Igor Jesus, Ndoye, Kalimuendo, Netz
CITY: Donnarumma, Khusanov, Dias (C), Guéhi, Gvardiol, Anderson, Fernández, Ndiaye, Cherki, Doku, Haaland
SUBS: Rulli, Kovačić, Reis, Nunes, Bouaddi, O’Reilly, Allan Elias, Foden, Lewis
Next Fixture
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Tactics
Enzo Maresca’s tactics are often fluid, but it looks like City will start in a 4-2-3-1 formation.
Gianluigi Donnarumma starts in goal, with Abdukodir Khusanov at right-back and Joško Gvardiol at left-back.
Rúben Dias captains the side and starts alongside Marc Guéhi at centre-half.
Elliot Anderson returns to his former club in a defensive midfield role, alongside Enzo Fernández, who will have licence to get forward and support attacks.
Iliman Ndiaye will play down the right, with Jérémy Doku on the left.
And in-form Rayan Cherki will play just off central striker Erling Haaland in attack.
Return to winning ways?
After winning our opening seven matches of the season in fine style, City come into this one on the back of two successive defeats in the Premier League.
It has allowed Arsenal, who face Hull City at the Emirates in one of the 15:00 (UK) kick-offs this afternoon, to edge ahead of us at the top of the table.
It’s early stages and no one at City will be panicking, but given the quality across the Premier League, City will be desperate to get back to winning ways today and reassert our credentials.
Match stats
Nottingham Forest have won one of their last nine Premier League games against Manchester City (D3 L5), a 1-0 home win in the 2024-25 season.
Manchester City are looking to record consecutive away top-flight wins at Nottingham Forest for the first time since January 1925.
Nottingham Forest are winless in their last six Premier League home games (D3 L3), failing to score in each of their last four. Only twice have they had a longer run without a home league goal – six games between November 2011/January 2012 and five games between December 2017/February 2018.
Nottingham Forest have failed to score in all four of their home league games this season, with three 1-0 defeats and a 0-0 draw. Only three teams in top-flight history have failed to score in their first five of a campaign – West Brom in 1921-22, Everton in 1998-99 and Huddersfield in 2018-19.
Having become the 10th team in English top-flight history to win each of their first seven games in a campaign, Man City have now lost their last two. Only Sheffield Wednesday in 1904-05 have won their first seven and then lost their next three.
Man City have lost their last two Premier League games, as many as they had in their previous 33 (W23 D8). Only once in the last 10 years have they lost more consecutively, losing four in a row in November/December 2024.
Despite having the second-most shots in the Premier League this season (152), Nottingham Forest have scored the fewest goals (6). They also have the lowest shot conversion rate (4%) and biggest negative xG difference (-8.3) so far this term.
Man City have the highest expected goals total (18.3), and the highest average xG per shot (0.13) of any side in the Premier League this season.
Morgan Gibbs-White could make his 200th Premier League appearance in this match. 151 of his 199 so far have been for Nottingham Forest, the third-most for the club in the competition.
Man City midfielder Elliot Anderson has made more passes while under high pressure than any other player in the Premier League this season (357).
