Bayern Munich and Manchester City will compete for the top spot in Group D of the Champions League on Tuesday.
Munich enters the contest with 15 points in five games while City has 12 in the same stretch of games. The two sides met a few months ago with Munich taking a 3-1 win in England. In order for City to finish first in the group it would need to reverse the aggregate and come away with a 3-0 or 4-1 win over the German side. Munich has only conceded two goals in the entire group stage and has been perfect at home thus far with shutouts in each home group match.
"Our first goal was to qualify for the next round, and second to win our group. I am looking forward to a really good game and hope the players understand how important it is. Manchester City have incredible players and are always able to create good chances. If we play our usual game, however, we have a good chance of finishing top. Coming second is not an option," said Bayern Munich manager Pep Guardiola, according to UEFA.com.
Manchester City's Joe Hart will make an appearance in goal for City; his poor performance against Munich in the previous group game was one of the reasons that he has been relegated to the role of backup in the last few weeks. City is hoping that he manages to bounce back from his previous poor performance against Munich and take back the starting goaltender position.
"It's an important game. We may have already qualified but we still need to improve and make up for our home defeat against Bayern. Joe Hart will play - we have to think about the present rather than the past and I have lots of confidence in his ability," said Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini, according to UEFA.com. "We would prefer to finish top of the group, but it's been tough having already played against a very strong Bayern team. They played better than us [in Manchester] and it will be extremely difficult to beat them 3-0 at their stadium. However, we will give everything to make that happen."
Prediction: Manchester City is not going to tilt the aggregate in its favor unless it comes up with a miraculous finish. Expect a 1-1 draw.
Start Time: 2:45 p.m. EST