I feel dirty, wading through all this crap, and I have to tell you, we are fortunate to have mancityfans.net. I have been digging through the main Stoke forum, and its just a mess. There are currently seven separate threads relating to our game. The forums are pretty lightweight as well, mostly drivel, and not much strategy talk ( at least compared to others ).
Overall they are confident, leaning slightly towards a draw. It sounds like they are unsure how Hughes is going to approach the game. I also think the Cardiff game did a lot of damage to us against teams like Stoke. Definitely a psychological boost for the fans, and I the team I imagine.
They also talk about this as a ‘bonus game’. Not sure what that is all about?
I have to say that this is one of my least favorite fixtures, but these two comments made me smile:
I did until I heard Clattenburg is the ref. Usually something contraversal when he refs & favours the big boys. Penalty or sending off against us I fear, hope I'm wrong.
Oh shit he loves being the centre of attention with some debatable decision that will almost certainly be against us with man city in town
Enjoy !
Straightforward start:
Bego
Cameron Huth Ryan Pieters
Wilson
Walters Nzonzi Adam Ethers
Jones
Sub:
Whelan
Jones
Crouch
2-1 to stoke'
I'll go for 1.1 (Kenwyne with our goal)
Same team against West Ham. Despite a solid performance, a 1-0 loss
I think Hughes will be a bit more cautious (defensive dare I say) because its against Shitty so I agree an unchanged team is most likely.
Injuries allowing i don't think he'll start with too many of our new signings as they wouldn't have trained with the squad yet. Does anyone know the fitness of Edu, Ness, Whelan, Palacios, Ireland ? We seem to be running out of fit CMs.
Kompany will hopefully still be out for it
I know that Man City have got great players all over the pitch, but if we contain their right hand side I think we're in with a chance.
Question is, how will Sparky look at it? Matty would provide extra defensive support for Pieters, but Assaidi would (hopefully) keep Zabaleta pegged back so he can't support Navas too often.
Personally, I'm hoping he goes down the Assaidi route, and keeps the rest of the team the same as the West Ham game.
Can't see Arnie or Ireland even being considered for a starting 11 spot for this one.
Prediction: 1.1 (Kenwyne with our goal)
If Citeh click then it could be a long afternoon but we've faced them before, more mismatched than now, so I'm not fearing them as previously.If we get into them from the first whistle and The Brit is rocking then who knows. It's up to us that Citeh are intimidated with a wall of noise...
I really think we can beat them at the Brit! Don't think there is a better time to play them. Just got a feeling a football playing Stoke team can take Man City and win.
On our day we can beat anyone at the brit, we would probably have to have the footballing gods on our side though as we are up against such quality. If i was a betting man my cash would go on a score draw and i'd be delighted with that.
Well Cardiff beat them so I don't see why not.
Silva is a doubt. Their defence is awful without Kompany.
We've done very nicely against City at the Brit up to now. Sparky just needs to try and keep it going?
Oh yes
3 - 1
Kenwyn with a brace. One from one of the new boys.
Can't wait, seems like weeks since the last one
With what I've watched of them this season Silva has looked very poor for his standards, so with him out that might not be a great thing. That new CB they have doesn't seem to have any positional awareness
If we can get at Toure, we could have a good chance. The crowd needs to get at the Manc twats from start to finish.
I did until I heard Clattenburg is the ref. Usually something contraversal when he refs & favours the big boys. Penalty or sending off against us I fear, hope I'm wrong.
Oh shit he loves being the centre of attention with some debatable decision that will almost certainly be against us with man city in town
how do the man city fans respect Hughsy ? if they are giving him aggro i expect stoke to be well fired up and thus a good game for stoke.
A 'non-football playing' Stoke team took on Man City and won
With all the connections etc, it has the making of a classic, and a famous victory for the Stoke
With all those new signings and Mark Hughes as our new manager,
I would be very surprised if we didn't got six points out of these two games.
Stoke-Man City 2-0
Arsenal-Stoke City 0-1
If we play like we did at Wet Sham then I think we could get all 3 points against what is i think a developing Man City side.
Two bonus games........ so let's park the bus.
Let's not get carried away just yet. We were excellent against West Ham, but these are two very, very difficult games
I think when the Mancs arrive we should give them a chorus of Attack Attack -scare the shit out of them - on about. 8 minutes
Forget the tippy tappy stuff,get Huth and Shawcross up top and launch it into the box,that flapper Hart won't know what day it is
Hull had the chances in the first half to win the game. But it shows if you have a go at them they can be beaten. Cardiff managed to do it
WE ARE CITY, so who the fcuk are the City you are on about? Surely not the arrogant twats who taunt "there's only one city" whenever they come to the Brit?
