Manchester City capped off their pre-season preparations with a comfortable win over Serie B side Palermo.
Erling Haaland characteristically opened the scoring before Tijjani Reijnders added a brace to secure a 3-0 victory against the Italian side.
City’s first Premier League opponents will be away at Wolves, who lost Rayan Ait-Nouri in a £36.3million deal to Pep Guardiola’s side.
Here, Daily Mail Sport’s Jack Gaughan reveals five things he learned from Saturday night’s clash in Italy.
HUGE WEEKS FOR GONZALEZ
It is hard to escape the idea that these are huge weeks in the City career of Nico Gonzalez.
Manchester City capped off their pre-season preparations with a 3-0 win against Palermo
Here, Daily Mail Sport’s Jack Gaughan reveals five things he learned from Saturday’s clash
Pep Guardiola has claimed that Rodri won’t be fully fit from a groin complaint until after the September international break, while Mateo Kovacic could be out until October following Achilles surgery.
Gonzalez – a £50million January signing from Porto – has been out of favour in recent months, starting only two of City’s last 11 matches and featuring for just an hour at the Club World Cup.
But Guardiola said this week that he counts those three as his defensive midfield options and if he sticks to that – using Tijjani Reijnders and Ilkay Gundogan further forward – then this is Gonzalez’s opportunity to lay down a marker.
Wolves has to be in the Spaniard’s mind and he did his case no harm during the intra-City Football Group friendly with Palermo (for the Anglo-Palermitan trophy, no less). It was what we’d seen from him whenever called upon: calm on the ball, seemingly having an extra half a second in possession, and a decent reader of situations.
Gonzalez swept up nicely – albeit caveated by Palermo being second tier opposition – and drove through the lines on a couple of occasions to provide City with some impetus. One interception high up the pitch led to a huge Rayan Cherki chance, although he was on the receiving end of a Guardiola glare when over hitting a long ball.
City have maintained all summer that the 23-year-old was going nowhere despite rumours to the contrary and there should be an acceptance that joining a Guardiola team as a midfielder is not the easiest assignment.
CLUES FROM PEP?
Having said all that, did Guardiola give a clue as to what his team looks like in the late kick off at Molineux next weekend?
These next few weeks are Nico Gonzalez’s opportunity to lay down a marker with Rodri out
Pep Guardiola may have given a clue as to what his team will look like versus Wolves next week
The City boss picked two separate sides for each half – only goalscorer Erling Haaland featuring in both, replaced on the hour by teenager Divine Mukasa – and the XI for the second period had a far more familiar feel to it.
First half: Trafford; Lewis, Khusanov, Stones, Ait-Nouri; Gonzalez, O’Reilly; Bobb, Cherki, Marmoush; Haaland
Second half: Ederson; Nunes, Akanji, Dias, Ake; Reijnders, Gundogan, Silva; Savinho, Haaland, Doku
Certainly when focusing on the attacking areas, Guardiola preferred the more natural wingers of Jeremy Doku and Savinho out in America. Reijnders, who netted the second goal of the night, is offering more options when arriving late into the box.
Yet never before have there been more question marks over Guardiola’s potential starting XI heading into a new campaign.
WILDCARD GOALSCORING THREAT
He might be wearing the No 4 but Reijnders is here to make up a goalscoring deficit in midfield – and proved what an asset he could become in Sicily.
Tijjani Reijnders netted a brace and could become a goalscoring asset for Guardiola’s side
Twice the Holland international broke into the box to score after half time, showing why Guardiola has made it clear his future lies in areas higher up the pitch.
Both finishes were smart, swept across goalkeeper Alfred Gomis, as he walked onto passes from Savinho and Mukasa. The second came after he’d started the move in his own half, while the 27-year-old somehow missed a glorious chance to record a hat-trick late on.
Regardless, City have missed those incisive runs into danger areas, which had become a hallmark of Guardiola’s team when Gundogan regularly ghosted in to post creditable numbers each year.
It shouldn’t come as a major surprise: Reijnders scored 18 goals in 62 appearances for club and country last season.
STONES STAYING?
John Stones: is he back? Or somewhere close? We don’t know but that’s 45 minutes against Preston North End last Saturday and another half here – his first appearances since hobbling out early of a humbling Champions League defeat in the Bernabeu on February 19.
Stones told us at the Club World Cup that he was fit and raring to go, wanting to make up for lost time but philosophical enough to admit that he’d flirted with the idea of retirement during his injury hell. He only managed 13 appearances last season.
The England international has consistently dismissed suggestions of him leaving this summer and seems sharp. Guardiola has an embarrassment of riches at centre half at the moment, with Stones, Ruben Dias, Josko Gvardiol, Abdukodir Khusanov, Manuel Akanji and Nathan Ake on the books.
John Stones looked sharp again and looks to be in contention to start at centre back for City
CITY GROUP CONNECTION
A star-studded delegation from City were attending Palermo’s new training ground to mark the Italians’ 125th anniversary. Hugo Viana, Ferran Soriano and chief operating officer Roet de Vries were among the executives to look at the facility in the afternoon before this friendly.
The City Football Group completed a takeover of Palermo in July 2022 when financial problems threatened the club’s existence. They’ve never owned training pitches before and in the past competed with the military for time slots on the grass – despite reaching Coppa finals and reaching the UEFA Cup.
It felt like a big night for Palermo, gunning for promotion from Serie B, with the 34,000-capacity selling out within three days. Head coach Filipo Inzaghi had his team in for a morning session on attacking patterns.
Supporters were inside the stadium well over an hour beforehand and the Ultras behind one goal paid homage to Oasis with a display ahead of kick off – shortly after local popstar Rosa Villain had done a four-song set.
As an aside, you can’t move for Oasis merchandise in Palermo with shops kitted out in hats and shirts all across the city.
