Manchester City v Burnley – Head To Head

Manchester City welcome Burnley to Manchester on Monday in their first free-to-air match of the season, and the blues will be looking to continue their excellent record against the Clarets.

The blues will look to end the season strongly and build on the 3-0 victory over Arsenal in their first match back following the Coronavirus outbreak. On paper, this should be a routine victory, but what do the stats say about this fixture?

City are currently unbeaten in 18 home matches against Burnley, stretching back to March 1967 when the blues beat the Clarets 1-0 at Maine Road. Although this is an excellent run of form, it isn’t the longest number of matches City have gone unbeaten against their Lancashire rivals.

The teams first meeting in Manchester was in November 1897 when the two teams played out a 1-1 draw. Burnley failed to then win any of their following 19 matches in Manchester, and had to wait until March 1952 for their first win on blue soil – a 1-0 at Maine Road broke City’s record. Over that 20 match run, City won 15, including a 9 match winning streak that started with a 1-0 win over the Clarets in March 1900.

Burnley would win on blue soil just six times since then – 3-1 and 1-0 in April and October 1956, 4-1 in December 1958, 2-1 in May 1960, 3-1 in September 1961 and their final win was a thumping 5-2 victory in March 1963, which is their biggest win in Manchester to dat.

By comparison, City’s biggest win is 8-3 in October 1925. But have also recorded high scoring wins in January 1903 (6-0), December 1968 (7-0), August 1999 (5-0), December 2001 (5-1), October 2018 and January 2019 (both 5-0).

Monday’s meeting will be the 51^st between the two sides in Manchester, and from those games, City have won 30, drawing 13 and losing 7, but it’s the number of goals scored by the blues that is even more impressive.

Over the previous 50 games, City have scored 123 times, an average of 2.46 goals per game. Burnley meanwhile average a goal of 1.06 per game, having scored 53 goals over the course of their visits. While this doesn’t sound much, Burnley have failed to score on 22 occasions, which means they average 1.89 goals in matches in which they score. City have failed to score on just six occasions, meaning their goal average in matches they score in increases to 2.79 per game, almost a goal more than their opponents!

For obvious reasons, these two teams have never met in June, but the most common month for this fixture to take place in is December, with the bleus welcoming Burnley to Manchester on nine occasions, while the least popular month is May, when the two teams have just twice.

Who will take the spoils on Monday?