How Manchester City could line up against Arsenal

Pep Guardiola's 200th match as Manchester City manager takes him to the Emirates Stadium on Sunday as the champions look to avoid falling even further behind at the top of the Premier League table.

City could be 17 points adrift of runaway league leaders Liverpool by the time they get underway against the Gunners, while the gap to Leicester City could have grown to nine points following a spell of wild inconsistency by their own standards.

Guardiola's side have enjoyed themselves against Arsenal in recent years, though, and will be favourites to get back to winning ways in the league against a team with only one win from their last 11 outings.

Here, Sports Mole looks at how the visitors could line up for the contest.

Out: Sergio Aguero (thigh), Aymeric Laporte (knee), John Stones (thigh), Leroy Sane (knee) Doubtful: Ederson (illness), David Silva (leg)

> Click here for Man City's latest injury and suspension news ahead of this match

Guardiola is still without some key players for this match, and his defensive troubles in particular have been exacerbated by John Stones being ruled out for "a few weeks".

Nicolas Otamendi is the only remaining senior choice to partner Fernandinho at the heart of the defence, then, and there could be a change at left-back too with Benjamin Mendy coming in for Angelino from the team that lost the derby last weekend.

Ederson is fully expected to feature after overcoming a bout of illness during the week, but a bigger question mark hangs over the head of David Silva, who was unable to train on Thursday or Friday due to a leg injury.

Ilkay Gundogan is seemingly the most likely man to start if Silva misses out, although Phil Foden did his chances no harm at all during the midweek Champions League win over Dinamo Zagreb.

Gabriel Jesus scored a hat-trick in that match and will lead the line again in the continued absence of record scorer Sergio Aguero, who could return next weekend.

> Click here to see how Arsenal could line up for this match