mancityblues.com

Big Sam is well up for this one, and has been speaking his mind on the influx of foreign managers in the English Game:-

They are fanciable at the moment aren't they? They are obviously the flavour of the month. That is probably because (Fabio) Capello has done so well for England and (Giovanni) Trapattoni has done alright for Ireland so everyone thinks that Italians are the way forward again. He's over here and he's going to test his skills in the Premier League for the first time. He's got a good record in Italy, but it appears that in Italy it isn't quite as good as it used to be, so everybody wants to come to the Premier League now because everyone knows this is the best place to be. Not only are all the players coming, all the coaches worldwide want to come. So we have a big challenge on our hands as Brits or English managers, to make sure we show them that we are just as good and in most cases, if given the chance, we manage to do the job as good if not better than them.

I kind of understand where Sam is coming from on this, but I believe he is more concerned that City have scoring talent where his team aren't exactly on fire, and whereas under Hughes we were open to attack, our Italian manager has gone some way towards closing the door defensively, and now Sam is not relishing the prospect of meeting us at home.

Again it looks on paper like a clear home win, but of course Mancini has his problems in that he is drilling a defence that has been cobbled together because of injuries to Onouha, Lescott and Bridge. Shay Given is still pulling off wonder stops to keep us in games, and will have to be on his game on Monday. A back four of Zaba, Richards, Kompany and Sylvinho or Garrido again seems likely. And I'm forgetting the debutante Boyata, who is growing in confidence with each game.

In midfield again, injuries to SWP, Robinho and Ireland may still continue to dog Mancini, so a line-up with Weiss, DeJong, Barry, Bellamy and Petrov appears strong enough to win balls and carry attacks.

RSC remains injured, as far as I know, which will upset all Rovers fans who were eager to give him the bird and Adebayor's absence at the African Nations kinda spoils things, so I would expect five in midfield and a lone Tevez up front unless he teams Tevez and Bellamy together.

In other words I haven't a clue.

It was interesting under Hughes to see his team selections and compare them with the posts on here, it's not so much now, because you know that Mancini is going to put out a side he believes will win, and they will know what is expected of them, there will be no slackers, and if things aren't going well, he'll change things around until they do.

2-0 therefore.