Matheus Nunes

Cherki scored a brilliant goal and was awarded man of the match for his performance against Liverpool over the weekend, and the City man is in brilliant form more widely ahead of this clash.

Cherki has registered six goal contributions across his five starts in the Premier League. He scored three goals across just four starts in the Champions League last season, so he’s clearly comfortable at this level and the momentum he carries into the game can’t be ignored.

Cherki registered 28 goal contributions across all competitions for Manchester City last season in a strong debut campaign. He seems to be getting even better under Maresca, who is more willing to use Cherki as a regular member of his starting eleven than Guardiola was.

It’s no secret that Ousmane Dembele saves his best form for these high profile games with Luis Enrique often rotating his side domestically to ensure that they have enough fitness to be ready for these high profile Champions League matches.

Dembele started in PSG’s opening game of the Champions League campaign against Slovan Bratislava, a game that the French side ended up winning 6-1 with Dembele walking away with four goal contributions. We only need him to have a hand in one goal here, which looks likely given his overall record in the Champions League.

Dembele registered 10 goal contributions across just 11 starts in the Champions League last season, building on the 24/25 campaign where Dembele was the best player of the competition - registering 14 goal contributions across 13 starts.

Nunes’ shift from a talented midfielder to one of the most reliable and consistent fullbacks in world football isn’t spoken about enough, Guardiola did an excellent job in profiling Nunes in this way and he’s now really settled in this role.

However, there are times where it is obvious that Nunes is not a natural fullback and those instances tend to be when  Nunes is up against a world class winger, as he will be here. His main opponent is likely to be Kvaratskhelia, who averaged 2.29 fouls won per 90 across 14 starts in the Champions League last season.

Nunes collected five yellow cards across his 32 starts in the Premier League last season, as well as committing five fouls across his five starts in the Champions League (1.04 per 90). I can see Kvaratskhelia really testing Nunes here, tempting him into committing a few fouls and picking up a card.

Hakimi has picked up one yellow card across his five starts in Ligue 1 already this season, and is an ideal candidate to pick up a caution again here with the right back set to be in a constant clash with Jeremy Doku.

Doku was the best player on the pitch when he came on against Liverpool at Anfield over the weekend, scoring a wonderful goal as well as winning three fouls and completing five dribbles inside just 34 minutes of action.

That snapshot is a good example of how good Doku can be when it comes to winning fouls, he’ll drive at Hakimi constantly and tempt him into a few late challenges. Hakimi collected three yellow cards and a red card in Ligue 1 last season, as well as two yellow cards in the Champions League.