Stoke City find themselves in relegation trouble with just 9 league games left to play, but the Potters have shown some good form recently and they could survive relegation after all.
However, they would need to find a way to get a point against this Manchester City team here first. They drew their last league game against fellow strugglers, Southampton, a result that means they are now winless in 5 games. More positively, they have lost only one of their last 6 games, they still remain inside the bottom 3 and they still have matches against Arsenal, Liverpool and Spurs before the season ends.
Manchester City lost their first home game in midweek against FC Basel, but it was a heavily rotated team which fell 2-1 to the Swiss side. They qualified for the next round of the Champions League anyway thanks to a 4-0 win in the first leg.
They still have a 16 points advantage over Manchester United in the Premier League race and they are on the brink of winning the title with games to spare. Their form at the turn of this new year has not been very good, especially away from home and they could fail to get all three points here again.
