Man City vs Wolves Odds
| Man City Odds | -1200 |
| Wolves Odds | +2700 |
| Draw | +1100 |
| Over / Under | 2.5 -126 / -104 |
In the reverse fixture in late September — a 2-1 Wolves win — Pep Guardiola was absent from the touchline, sitting in the directors' box with Txiki Begiristain as he was recovering from back surgery. On Saturday, the Manchester City boss will be back at pitch-level while his counterpart, Gary O'Neil, watches on from the stands, serving a one-match suspension for yellow card accumulation.
The last time Wolves beat Manchester City in their first meeting of a league campaign, they went on to win the second contest as well. In the 2019/20 season, the Midlands side bested the Cityzens at the Etihad through an Adama Traore brace and then came back from 2-0 down at the Molineux to claim all three points.
It's unlikely Wolves will be able to repeat the same feat of doing the double over the reigning champions — they're currently +2700 to win tomorrow — but there are other betting angles that can be exploited in this one.
Read on for my Man City vs Wolves pick and prediction and Premier League match preview.
Man City
It's pretty simple for City. Win their last four matches and they will lift their fourth-consecutive Premier League title. They're basically at full-strength now, with Erling Haaland available to start and the pair of Phil Foden and Ruben Dias recovered from illness that kept them out of last weekend's trip to Nottingham Forest — the Cityzens prevailed 2-0. The only injured first-team player is Ederson, but Guardiola has said he's close to returning as well, and there's probably not a better deputy goalkeeper in world football than Stefan Ortega, so City are fine between the posts.
While they did lose to Wolves earlier in the year, it's difficult to read too much into that result because of the way City lined up. It's almost a guarantee Guardiola won't deploy Mateo Kovacic as the pivot in a 3-1-5-1 in-possession shape again, and Julian Alvarez is unlikely to have a spot in the starting XI either. Rodri will put in a much better showing than Kovacic, and, it's not a knock on Alvarez, but Kevin De Bruyne is Kevin De Bruyne. It's also important to note, City are currently on their longest league unbeaten run in club history, and on top of that Rodri has played 70 matches in a row without defeat. In other words, Rodri is critical to his team's success, and that team is one of the best in the world.
Wolves
Having written about Wolves a few times previously in the last month or so, I feel like every time I've said something along the lines of "it's been a tough run for Wolves, but injuries haven't helped, and they're getting guys back," and someone else gets hurt and they lose again. I understand that makes what I'm about to say hard to believe, but they might actually be out of the woods with regards to injuries now, I promise.
Coming off a 2-1 home win against Luton, O'Neil and co. appear to have gotten a boost in terms of squad depth this week, with Pedro Neto and Santiago Bueno fit enough to play. Jean-Ricner Bellgarde supposedly will also be a part of the matchday squad, so that just leaves Craig Dawson as the only major absence. Neto's contributions in particular will be crucial to Wolves' success in this one, as his team will be sitting deep in a 5-3-2/5-4-1 block, and he provides ball-carrying and off-ball runs that no one else in this team can. Against a team that will have spells of sustained pressure and dominate territory, Wolves' ability to threaten in transition is going to determine how their match goes. Hwang Hee-chan and Matheus Cunha are capable of achieving that themselves, but Neto is THE guy, and even just a 30-minute cameo off the bench from him could be crucial.
Man City vs Wolves
Prediction
We've seen it time and time again this season: Manchester City aren't as sturdy in defensive transitions this season as they have been in previous campaigns. Even last weekend, where they kept a clean sheet, Chris Wood should've found the back of the net multiple times from those situations for Nottingham Forest. Wolves have the pace and ball-carrying ability to create chances on the break, especially if and when Neto is on the pitch.
Whether they'll be able to keep City out at the other end is a completely different story, but at 45.5% implied probability I like the value on the over for Wolves' team total of 0.5.
