Sports Blog 10/12/2014 – Match Preview - Roma vs Manchester City, Wednesday 10th December

Group E is going to be a statistician’s dream tonight, as any of Manchester City, Roma and CSKA Moscow can join already-qualified Bayern Munich in progressing to the next round of the Champions League.

The main battle ground will be in Italy’s capital, as Roma take on Manchester City at the Stadio Olimpico.

Take a deep breath, because here are the various permutations for qualification tonight: with all three teams under Bayern on 5 points, to stand their best chance of going through City need to win. If CSKA Moscow lose, City just need a 2-2 draw (or higher) to go through. If CSKA Moscow win, City are out, regardless of the outcome against Roma. However, there is a final twist in the tale, as if BOTH games are a draw, Roma go through.

If this statistical headache wasn’t enough, City will be without their two key men, Sergio Aguero and Yaya Toure, through injury and suspension respectively. With Aguero scoring 19 goals in 21 games, and Toure providing another 6 goals to be City’s second top scorer this season, the loss of these two could be fatal.

As both Roma sits in second behind Juventus in the Serie A, and City sit in second behind Chelsea, there isn’t much difference in terms of form. In their last 6 games Roma have seen 3 wins, 2 draw and a loss, whilst since a 2-2 draw against QPR, City are on a 5 game winning streak, including that last minute win against Bayern Munich. However, any slight benefit in form for City will most likely be negated by the absence of Aguero, who has been their engine this season.



As our Spreadex clients look to tonight’s game, we have seen plenty of bets on Roma Goal Supremacy at a spread of Roma/Manchester City 0.05-0.25. And as Aguero is missing, there are some interesting odds on first goal scorer. With rumours of a January move to Arsenal swirling around today, Roma’s Mattia Destro is joint favourite alongside Edin Dzeko to score first, with both at fixed odds betting of 6/1. Both have only scored 4 goals this season, with Destro not finding the net since late October, and Dzeko only recently recovering from an injury.

With the multiple possible outcomes tonight, both teams will have an ear to the wire on CSKA’s performance against Bayern. City would do better to focus on patching the holes left by Aguero and Toure, as Edin Dzeko looks to prove himself worthy in the face of the Argentine’s absence.