Premier League updates from St Mary’s, kick-off 2.15pm GMTFernandinho’s absence reveals flaw in the City masterplanAnd feel free to email Nick or tweet @NickAmes82 1.55pm GMT Chelsea have won at Palace – Kante scoring the clincher. They stay fourth, ahead of Arsenal by five points. 1.47pm GMT 24y 274d - Southampton's starting XI vs Man City today has an average age of 24 years & 274 days; their youngest in a Premier League match for five years (Dec 2013 vs Newcastle). Prospects. pic.twitter.com/i48xcBrIJtA good Saints stat. They’ll be looking to harry City intensively, I fancy. 1.37pm GMT City fans, do you think the wheels have come off? Or is this just the sort of blip that should normally happen to everyone, accentuated by the fact Liverpool have come to look so imperious? The tempo on and off the ball is just that little bit down, isn’t it – is Guardiola’s style that difficult to maintain over a period of years? I don’t know, but I’d like to hear if you do. 1.27pm GMT As I write, Crystal Palace are hosting Chelsea. They’re doing so fairly graciously at the moment, as they’re a goal down. Can’t they play Man City every week? Jacob Steinberg has the MBM: Related: Crystal Palace v Chelsea: Premier League – live! 1.22pm GMT Southampton: McCarthy, Ramsey, Bednarek, Stephens, Targett, Romeu, Elyounoussi, Lemina, Hojbjerg, Ward-Prowse, Austin. Subs: Yoshida, Long, Ings, Armstrong, Redmond, Gunn, Valery.Man City: Ederson, Danilo, Kompany, Laporte, Zinchenko, Bernardo Silva, Fernandinho, Silva, Mahrez, Aguero, Sterling. Subs: Walker, Stones, Sane, Otamendi, Gabriel Jesus, Foden, Muric. 10.03am GMT What have we here? Manchester City *scrambling* to stay in the title race? Not quite – but almost, sort of. They are 10 points behind Liverpool, a tally that hardly seems believable, and really need to buck up pronto if Jurgen Klopp’s men aren’t going to to disappear over the horizon in the manner they did last season. If that sounds a touch alarmist, consider that City host Liverpool on Thursday – if they don’t get something today then it’s arguable the entire season hinges on that. Which it might anyway.Glad we’ve cleared all that up. Basically it all means we’re in for a fascinating and possibly very critical 90 minutes in the season. It’s hard to know what to expect from Southampton, who – *controversial opinion alert* – weren’t terrible under Mark Hughes but had found a bit of extra bite under Ralph Hasenhuttl until their defeat to West Ham. In truth we won’t really know what the Saints are until next season. Hasenhuttl has fairly complex ideas of pressing and work without the ball, in particular, and you’d imagine he will instil those in fairly lite form until they are over the safety line. But this certainly seems a slippery one for Guardiola and company against an unpredictable side that will be up for it – and probably not a fixture they wanted at this stage. Continue readingreadfullarticle
