Amid fears of Pep Guardiola rotating members of his front-three for the Gameweek 5 trip to Norwich, he has gone to new levels of pulling the rug from under our feet.
While Sergio Aguero (£12.1m) and Raheem Sterling (£12.3m) both start for Saturday evening’s trip to Carrow Road, it was the presumed nailed-on Kevin de Bruyne (£9.8m) who has fallen foul of ‘Pep Roulette’.
After starting every Premier League match so far this season, the Belgian has dropped to the Manchester City bench, while Guardiola has chosen to deploy a central midfield trio of David Silva (£7.5m), Rodrigo (£5.5m) and Ilkay Gündogan (£5.3m).
While Sterling and Aguero both start this one, their owners may just have one eye on Riyad Mahrez (£8.5m) and Gabriel Jesus (£9.5m) among the substitutes with the Champions League group stages starting midweek.
With options relatively limited in defence, there were no surprises in the back-four named for this encounter.
Ederson (£6.1m) is supported at the back by Oleksandr Zinchenko (£5.6m), Nicolas Otamendi (£5.4m), John Stones (£5.4m) and Kyle Walker (£6.0m).
Just as predicted by manager Daniel Farke in his Friday press conference, Norwich do indeed look very short of options in their own defence.
Ben Godfrey (£4.5m) has come through his groin injury picked up on international duty to feature at centre-back alongside defensive midfielder Ibrahim Amadou (£4.5m).
Their inclusion in the side does mean that at the very least, their fit full-backs are not called into central defensive action.
Jamal Lewis (£4.5m) features on the left with Sam Byram (£4.4m) getting his first start for the Canaries on the right.
Meanwhile, both Teemu Pukki (£7.0m) and Todd Cantwell (£4.8m) retain their places in the first team.
Norwich City XI: Krul; Lewis, Godfrey, Amadou, Byram; McLean, Tettey; Cantwell, Stiepermann, Buendía; Pukki.
Manchester City XI: Ederson; Zinchenko, Otamendi, Stones, Walker; D Silva, Gundogan, Rodrigo; Sterling, Aguero, B Silva.
5 years, 8 days agoKevin on