Manchester City vs. Sporting Predictions: We're expecting City to coast to the win here

Sporting were well and truly outclassed in their own back yard a little over three weeks ago by Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City in what was a dominant display by the English side, despite the Spaniards criticism over his teams “underperformance” in Portugal.

The Citizens flourished early on in Lisbon, a 4-0-halftime score line almost certainly put the tie to bed just a quarter of the way through. Raheem Sterling netted the only goal after the break resulting in a new competition record where they became the first team to win five consecutive knockout away games.

Ruben Amorim’s side didn’t have much to shout about in Lisbon, a total of 36% possession along with just 3 shots, without forcing Ederson in making a save, was all they could conjure up in what was there first knockout UCL knockout stage in over a decade.

The current Champions League runners up had it pretty much all there own way in the capital, 15 goal attempts, 6 corners as well as 64% of the ball gives you a good indication of the opening legs antics.

Heading into the return leg the Portuguese side will know themselves that they’ll need a miracle to even come close to giving City a minor scare at the Ethiad. Sporting have had their own difficulties domestically in recent weeks which has seen them fall 6 points adrift in the title race and also have a 2-1 deficit to overturn going into the Semi Final second leg of Taca De Portugal.

The hosts arrive in high spirits after dismantling their city rivals Manchester United on Sunday afternoon in a performance where the ‘Red Devils’ literally couldn’t get near them in the second half. Prior to that victory the current Premier League champions navigated themselves into the Quarter Final of the FA Cup.

Sporting Lisbon began the journey to Manchester on Tuesday morning with a squad that doesn’t include 23-year-old midfielders, Matheus and Pedro Gonclaves who are absent due to suspension and injury for the latter. Joao Palhinha is set to be out also with an injury, the midfielder played the full 90 in the opening leg alongside the suspended Matheus so numbers are expected to be short in an area City are so dominant in.

Pep Guardiola will be without key players in defensive positions, Nathan Ake and Ruben Dias are unavailable due to injury whilst Kyle Walker is still serving a suspension after his red card in the final group stage game in Germany.

From a betting point of view this fixture is a tricky one to navigate round especially with the hosts having a 5-0 lead at their advantage however I cant turn away from City adding to the aggregate score line on Wednesday night.

The hosts are valued @ 1.14 (1/7) to take all three points again which is ridiculously short. Whilst taking the unavailable players into consideration the home side should have more than enough to overcome the Portuguese club who are massive outsiders @ 22/1 which may be worth the odd bit of change purely down to the price on offer.

Alike many I’m favouring a home win, however to add some value I’m backing under 3.5 match goals which boosts the odds from a mere 1/7 all the way to an enticing 11/10. Pep will set out a more than good enough squad to come away with a victory leading them into the next round but know the hard work was done in the previous encounter.