After leaving it late to claim maximum points in a 2-1 Premier League victory at Wolverhampton Wanderers last weekend, Manchester City cruised to a 5-0 home win against Sparta Prague in the Champions League on Wednesday night.
Phil Foden put the Citizens ahead in the third minute, before three goals in the space of 10 second-half minutes saw the hosts take control of the contest. Erling Haaland scored twice, including an acrobatic backheel volley, either side of John Stones‘s header, before Matheus Nunes – an impressive performer on the night – added a fifth with a late penalty.
Pep Guardiola‘s side have climbed to third in the 36-team UCL table having accumulated seven points from the first three fixtures, and they have also become the first team in European Cup/Champions League history to go 26 games unbeaten in the competition, breaking the previous record held by rivals Manchester United (25).
A trip to Sporting Lisbon on matchday four is pencilled in for early November, but Man City must now shift their focus back to the Premier League where they are the only team yet to lose after eight matches. Sitting second with 17 points, the Citizens will move to the summit with a victory over Southampton, before current leaders Liverpool lock horns with third-placed Arsenal on Sunday.
Man City, who are enjoying their longest-ever unbeaten Premier League run (31), will fancy their chances of success on Saturday as they have won 10 of their last 13 top-flight meetings with Southampton, while they are unbeaten in 12 encounters with the Saints at the Etihad (W10 D2).
For the first time in English top-flight history, as many as four teams have failed to win any of their opening eight games, and one of those are Southampton, who have draw one and lost seven matches since gaining promotion from the Championship last season.
The Saints were seemingly on course to claim their first three points of the campaign against Leicester City last weekend after Cameron Archer and Joe Aribo had given them a two-goal half-time lead. However, a brilliant second-half revival from the Foxes, including a dramatic 98th-minute winner, turned the contest on its head and they came away from St Mary’s with a 3-2 victory.
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Southampton have now gone 21 Premier League games without a win (D5 L16) and although the pressure is beginning to mount on head coach Russell Martin, the club’s hierarchy reportedly have no immediate plans to part ways with the 38-year-old. Guardiola, meanwhile, has insisted that Martin “will have success sooner or later” with the Saints.
Sitting 19th in the Premier League table with just one point, but only three points adrift of safety, Southampton head into Saturday’s match seeking to avoid failing to win any of their opening nine matches of a league campaign since 1998-99 (nine).
Claiming a positive result against Man City will be a tall order for the Saints, though, as they have only won one of their last 14 Premier League meetings with the Citizens – a 1-0 home win in July 2020 – while they last celebrated success at the Etihad back in April 2004 when they won 3-1 under former boss Paul Sturrock
