Alex Jack's selections for Sunday's FA Cup semi-final include a double chance bet on Forest and a City player to be carded.
Manchester City are seeking a place in the FA Cup final for the third successive season when they take on Nottingham Forest in Sunday’s semi-final.
Pep Guardiola’s team beat their rivals Manchester United 2-1 in the final two years ago but lost to the Red Devils by the same score last time.
Forest will be doing everything they can to make the final for the first time since they lost to Tottenham in 1991 and a fascinating clash is anticipated in the capital. Here are our football betting tips.
Nottingham Forest v Man City tips
Nottingham Forest to win or draw /
First-half result: Draw /
Matheus Nunes to be carded /
Forest can test City again
Manchester City cruised to a 3-0 win over Nottingham Forest in their first Premier League meeting this season, but the Tricky Trees levelled the season score at the City Ground in the teams’ most recent meeting last month with a 1-0 success and they should provide a serious challenge for the competition favourites.
Having gone seven matches without defeat, City are having their best spell of form since things unexpectedly went off the rails for them in the autumn and they suffered an unthinkable sequence of 13 matches in which their only win was the home victory against Forest.
City’s up-and-down form continued through to their defeat in Nottingham and while they are on a solid run now they did not really have to do anything out of the ordinary in wins over Bournemouth, Leicester, Crystal Palace and Everton.
The 2-1 win over Aston Villa last time out was therefore their most notable result for some time, but even that arrived only through a last-minute winner from Matheus Nunes and City are not an attractive price to win in 90 minutes given that star striker Erling Haaland remains sidelined with an ankle injury.
Forest have suffered a couple of recent setbacks with Premier League defeats by Villa and Everton (to a last-minute goal) but their confidence should have been boosted by Monday’s 2-1 win at Tottenham.
There was no fluke about their win over City in the teams’ last meeting, when the visitors struggled to make any inroads against a solid home defence, and Forest are worth backing in the double-chance market to at least force extra-time.
Tight first half in prospect
The recent match between these teams was goalless at half-time and backing their Wembley clash to reach the interval with the scores level could pay.
There is little between the teams in the Premier League table with City one place and one point ahead, although Forest have a game in hand, and neither side has been particularly quick out of the blocks in their recent matches.
City have been in front by half-time in only three of their last 12 matches and they are on a run of four consecutive first-half draws, after goalless first 45 minutes against Manchester United and Everton, a 2-2 first half at Crystal Palace and one early goal each against Villa.
Forest have grabbed an early advantage in three of their last 11 fixtures and five of their last nine have been goalless at the break.
Nunes could go into the book
Three players are missing from this match due to FA Cup suspensions with City’s James McAtee and Forest pair Ryan Yates and Neco Williams all unavailable.
Nunes was City’s hero on Tuesday night when he scored the late winning goal against Aston Villa but he had earlier picked up his seventh yellow card of the season and is a likely candidate to be carded again at Wembley.
The midfielder has been filling in at right-back in recent matches and while he has done a fantastic job for his team he has been guilty of 12 fouls in his last seven games.
Nunes has been shown three yellow cards in his last six matches, including a caution against Forest when he fouled Morgan Gibbs-White, and his defensive skills should be tested again by Tricky Trees’ forward players.
