Kick-off: 1600, 22/05/2022
Stadium: Etihad Stadium
TV: Sky Sports
Manchester City are expected to overwhelm Aston Villa and wrap up a fourth Premier League title triumph in five years under Pep Guardiola.
Second-placed Liverpool will be hoping former Anfield star Steven Gerrard can do them a favour, but his Villa players face a formidable task here.
An early goal would get the celebrations going and 3.2 for the Blues to be ahead after 15:00 minutes is our initial Man City vs Aston Villa prediction.
Manchester City Odds
City showed some signs of nerves when going 2-0 down at West Ham last weekend but hit back through Jack Grealish and a Vladimir Coufal own goal.
They would have been in an even better position if Riyad Mahrez’s late penalty hadn’t been saved, but a one-point lead over Liverpool still sets things up nicely.
This could be a special occasion for Grealish, who has had a patchy campaign since joining City for £100million from Villa last summer.
He told the club website: “It just had to be against Aston Villa, didn’t it? But it doesn’t matter about me and it doesn’t matter who we play against.
“We will try to get all three points and you want to make it as easy as you can for yourselves.
“We have a great home record, all our fans will be behind us, it will be a great day. Fingers crossed we can go and get the win.
“It’ll be different for me, I’ve never had that before, to play for a game to win a title. I’m looking forward to it. I can’t wait.”
Guardiola has plenty of options, so Grealish isn’t guaranteed a place in the starting line-up, but he should appear at some stage.
Looking at the 7.5 for the England ace to grab the last goal in this game.
Last City line-up: Ederson, Laporte, Cancelo, Zinchenko, Rodri, De Bruyne, Silva, Fernandinho, Jesus, Grealish, Mahrez.
Aston Villa Odds
Social media outlets have been full of jokes about Villa boss Gerrard having the chance to finally help win a league title for Liverpool.
The 41-year-old missed out on that accolade with the Reds, but did enjoy two FA Cup wins, three League Cup triumphs and a Champions League success during his glorious playing career on Merseyside.
His Villa team could actually move up four places and secure a top-10 finish with a shock victory here – and Gerrard insists that is the priority.
He declared: “We’ll go out at the weekend and give it everything we’ve got to try and get points for Aston Villa and our supporters.
“If that inevitably helps Liverpool, fantastic, but my priority is to try and get points for Aston Villa.
“We’ve got three massive points to play for, we’ve got an opportunity to finish the season on a high.
“It would be nice if we can reward our supporters with something at the weekend.”
Villa are in decent form, only losing out to Liverpool in their last six matches, and that was a competitive contest.
However, they have lost five straight league meetings with City since coming back up and the Blues have won their last three domestic home matches this term by an aggregate score of 13-1.
Let’s add 9.25 for a 4-0 scoreline.
Last Villa line-up: Martinez, Mings, Chambers, Digne, Cash, Douglas Luiz, McGinn, Buendia, Chukwuemeka, Ramsey, Watkins.
Additional stats
Player statistic
| 37' |  |
Matty Cash (Assist: Lucas Digne) |
| 49' |  |
Tyrone Mings | ||
| 69' | |
Philippe Coutinho (Assist: Ollie Watkins) | ||
| Ilkay Gündogan (Assist: Raheem Sterling) |
|
76' | ||
| Rodri (Assist: Oleksandr Zinchenko) |
|
78' | ||
| Ilkay Gündogan (Assist: Kevin De Bruyne) |
|
81' | ||
| 87' | |
Marvelous Nakamba |
Match statistic
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