West Brom vs Man City - Wed 4th Dec KO 20:00

The first of two important away games sees us travel to the Hawthorns to play West Brom, the baggies haven't been good at home and we haven't been good away so we could be in for an interesting game.

I have only seen a minimal amount of West Brom this season so I can't give a valid opinion on them, all I can say is that the little bit of them that I have seen, they looked decent. I have studied their results this season and whilst there was fixtures that I would of thought that they were capable of winning, there are others that they have done really well to take points from. A draw at Chelsea, a draw at home against Arsenal and a win at Old Trafford suggest that they have got the ability to compete against the better teams in the league.

As we all know, we haven't achieved the right results on the road this season, but that's not to say our performances have been all that bad when away from home. Our performances against the likes of Chelsea and Cardiff were not worthy of a defeat and then there was the defeat to Aston Villa which was quite astonishing, however reasoning's are only as good as excuses and the bottom line is that we have to start winning away games.

I am positive that we are going to start winning away from home and when we do it is going to spell bad news for the rest of the league. Just winning this game against West Brom would start making teams sweat, our title rivals know as well as we do that if we become consistent away from home that they are going to have a job on their hands to compete.

Good news ahead of the game tomorrow is that Vincent Kompany is back in the squad, whether that means he will play or not remains to be seen, I would imagine it does. I just hope that Pellegrini doesn't try to accommodate Demichelis along side him, he hasn't done anything wrong as such, I just don't want to see him shoved on the left hand side of Kompany ahead of Lescott whose natural position is left half, plus Lescott played well there against Swansea.

Man City Team News:
Vincent Kompany gives us a much needed boost in defence by returning to the side, Matija Nastasic, David Silva and Stevan Jovetic are all still absent from the team with calf injuries.

West Brom Team News:
Youssouf Mulumbu is missing for the home side as he serves a one match suspension for picking up five yellow cards, Scott Sinclair has a hamstring injury but would not have been eligible to play against his parent club anyway, Ben foster is in light training but is not expected to be ready to return to the team.

Possible Man City Line Up: Pantilimon, Zabaleta, Kompany, Lescott, Clichy, Toure, Fernandinho, Navas, Nasri, Aguero, Negredo.

Possible West Brom Line Up: Myhill, Jones, McAuley, J Olsson, Ridgewell, Amalfitano, Morrison, Sessegnon, Yacob, Brunt, Long.

My Prediction: West Brom 0 - 4 Man City.

Worth A Bet: Man City win the game 0 - 4 with Sergio Aguero scoring the first goal @ 66/1 or Alvaro Negredo scoring the first goal @ 75/1, also any first goalscorer bets involving Vincent Kompany have good odds, may be worth a quid on the returning captain.

West Brom 0 - 2 Man City (Balotelli 20',26',s/o 63',Mulumbu s/o 82') *Video*

What a relief, we badly needed to take three points at West Brom to stay in the hunt for the title.

Our goals were scored by our new boy wonder Mario Balotelli, he scored his first goal by making his way into the box before sliding in to get on the end of a ball put across the box by Carlos Tevez. His next goal came from a David Silva up field ball, Mario's first touch took the ball into the air but he stayed strong, brought it down, took it out wide and shot across the keeper to send the ball into the bottom corner. He did let himself down just after the hour mark though, getting sent off for leaving is foot in after a tangle with Mulumbu, who was also later sent off himself. Goals and highlights below!

I was impressed with our performance yesterday, we made a team who have been playing a lot of good football this season look totally inferior. We went back to what we are good at, keeping the ball and moving it around. Credit has to go to all concerned Mancini had one of his days where he got all his tactics right and the players certainly put his plan into action with effect.

There was more talk after the game that Tevez is the difference but yesterday our main man was Yaya Toure. It is only fair to mention his performance because although with good reason, I have slated him all season, yesterday he was the player that I have seen play for Barcelona. He attacked well, passed well and defended well, you just could not have asked for more from him. Maybe the fitness programme that I have been informed he is on is working.

It's not only Toure who impressed though, there is a few more of the lads that are consistently proving that they are instrumental to City. Obviously Tevez I don't have to say anymore on how important he is, but I think the likes of Nigel de Jong who absolutely holds our midfield together and Vincent Kompany who has to be the best centre half in the league don't get the the credit they deserve in the media. As well as those two more recently David Silva has settled in and has started to show his class, I don't think I have seen a player at City with so much natural ability since Kinky, he is just different class when you watch him play football.

Now please City! Again you have shown us you can get it 100% right, lets keep it going and the title may be more than a realistic target this season.

Next up for us, Manchester United at home on Wednesday.

Goals and Highlights.

Man City 4 - 2 West Brom (Robinho 8' Onuoha 21' Elano 56'(pen) Sturridge 90', Brunt 37',54')

With the Sun beating down on Eastlands City thought they would make us sweat a bit more, they set about winning the game the hard way.

We started off ok today nothing spectacular but we were playing good enough, after taking the lead through a Robinho volley and then an Onuoha header in the first 21 minutes we began to take it easy. The team were very laid back and didn't seem to have anything to worry about but as soon as the game went to 2 - 1 the team totally fell apart, we lost our shape and West Brom were taking advantage of us. Not long into the second half West Brom scored again to level things up and they probably deserved it as well, luckily Elano managed to win a penalty and then went on to score it to make it 3 - 2. The game was finished off by a Daniel Sturridge goal in the closing stages.

The score line from today's game will look good on paper but City scoring four goals is not a fair reflection on how we or West Brom played. We were treating the game like a training session after we went 2 up but as soon as West Brom got a goal back we were at panic stations, I understand that they might have been worried about a good attacking West Brom team getting an equaliser, but for professionals to fall apart the way they did was pathetic.

I knew West Brom could give us problems after seeing them in other games, they were very well set up and strong in midfield, its hard to see why they haven't picked up more points. Of course we made them look slightly better than they are today, we left ourselves wide open on the flanks and they were constantly exploiting us, why it wasn't changed to stop it happening is beyond me.

Our defence has been a big problem for us lately Bridge and dare I say it Dunne have been shocking, they are both players with quality but for some reason they are not showing us what they are made of. Where there is bad we have good as well, Nedum Onuoha is an absolute star for us at the moment. He is such a calming influence at the back and if he wasn't playing we would be in big trouble, surely his form will be rewarded with a senior England call up very soon.

I will try to look on the bright side of a bad performance, we got three points, the threat of relegation has surely gone, there is still a possibility of qualifying for Europe and Robinho scored his first goal of 2009.

Just a quick mention about the atmosphere today, where did it go?

Man City vs West Brom - Sun 19Th Apr 15:00 pm

Next to visit Eastlands is West Brom, although its unlikely they will escape relegation I am sure they will keep fighting to the end and will pose a threat to us tomorrow. If City don't win we could find ourselves in our own relegation battle.

This is quite a big game for us tomorrow, if we don't win we are going to have the threat of relegation hanging over us, never mind the fact that we will have no chance of making Europe. Honestly though I can't see us doing anything but winning, West Brom are not a terribly bad team but I think we are so so much better than them, if we don't win then it could really make our owners have a serious think about what action they will take come the end of the season.

Hughes has been blaming poor performances on fatigue lately and quite frankly the team wasn't playing well enough to be feeling tired, saying that after all the effort they put in against Hamburg it is a big possibility they might be feeling some strain now. I hope that is not the case though because we really need to stay in good form and make a really big push going into the last few games of the season, especially considering our hopes of 7Th place are seriously hanging by a thread.

It is going to be slightly interesting to see what team Hughes puts out tomorrow, I think we would all like to see two up front but I doubt Hughes will do that. It is beyond me why he won't play two up front but he seems to like having only one up top. If he is relying on Caicedo to be a target man that is not going to happen, he likes the ball at his feet and because Hughes uses him the way he does, Caicedo is receiving some undeserved flack from the fans. One player we are surely going to see tomorrow is Elano, he was different class against Hamburg and must have earned himself a second consecutive start, if he doesn't start the game that would be another strange decision. Someone I am hoping not to see play is Wayne Bridge he just isn't good enough, I didn't point it out on my post match after the Hamburg game because it would have been unfair, but what was he doing for their goal. As well as his obvious lack of ability he doesn't look interested most of the time and I think he should be dropped.

Instead of letting them gather dust why not bring the flags and bananas back to Eastlands tomorrow and try to make the atmosphere we created against Hamburg a regular thing.

City team news:
Bellamy is expected to miss out with a knee injury. Wright-Phillips may return from an ankle injury and De Jong and Bojinov should return to the squad after being ineligible for the Uefa Cup. Zabaleta may miss out after picking up a knock against Hamburg, Kompany may be rested after playing through injury on Thursday.

West Brom team news:
Shelton Martis is out with a groin injury but Gianni Zuiverloon seems to have recovered from a minor injury. Roman Bednar is hoping that he has shaken off a hamstring injury in time to make the squad.

Possible Man City line up: Given, Richards, Onuoha, Dunne, Bridge, De Jong, Wright-Phillips, Ireland, Elano, Robinho, Caicedo.

Possible West Brom line up: Carson, Zuiverloon, Meite, Olsson, Robinson, Morrison, Greening, Koren, Dorrans, Brunt, Fortune.

My prediction: Man City 3 - 0 West Brom.

Worth a bet: Elano and Robinho score in a 3 - 0 City win.