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Man City looking to win 17th league game in a row

Four months ago at Dean Court, Manchester City kickstarted an English Premier League record run of 16 wins.

Today, Pep Guardiola's side take on Bournemouth again, this time looking for their 17th in a row.

                      EPL
MANCHESTER CITY BOURNEMOUTH

The Spaniard admitted that he probably wouldn't have believed it had somebody back then told him that the win over the Cherries would be the beginning of something this incredible.

Guardiola said of the 2-1 victory over Bournemouth in August: "It was important after the draw against Everton.

"Nobody expected then we would win 16 games in a row. After that, we won against Liverpool. You are not always able to win games by a big margin so, at that moment, it was important."

That match at Bournemouth gave City their unstoppable momentum.

They followed that up with a 5-0 win over Liverpool, 6-0 victory over Watford and a 5-0 triumph over Crystal Palace. The rest, as they say, is history.

For today's match at the Etihad Stadium, Guardiola will be without injury-prone skipper Vincent Kompany, who needs a few more days to return to the line-up. Guardiola also revealed that he is unsure playmaker David Silva, who has missed the last two games for personal reasons, will be playing.

  • If Man City beat Bournemouth today, it will be the joint-second longest winning run in one of Europe's big five leagues (17 games). The current record is 19, achieved by Pep Guardiola's Bayern Munich in 2013-14.

But he confirmed that rising star Phil Foden's injury sustained during the midweek League Cup penalty shoot-out win over Leicester City is as bad as initially feared.

He said: "It's a ligament. He'll be out for a time. The referees need to protect the players."

Eddie Howe's Bournemouth, who are in 16th place, will be going into the game hoping for Lady Luck to smile on them.

Said Howe: "We have to believe that we can win. It's going to be extremely difficult and we're probably going to need a bit of luck." - WIRE SERVICES

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