Brentford vs Man City injury & suspension list including Ivan Toney & Jack Grealish - gallery

Manchester City have seven injury doubts heading into Sunday’s Premier League game.

Pep Guardiola has insisted Sunday’s Premier League match against Brentford is important preparation for Manchester City ahead of upcoming finals against Manchester United and Inter Milan, in the FA Cup and Champions League respectively.

“I’m going to play the game as real as possible, see how they feel in terms of condition,” sais the City boss in his pre-match press conference. “We don’t want to take a risk. We take a team to win the game.

“It is meaningless in terms of points, but the way we played against Brighton, it doesn’t mean that. Brighton [on Wednesday] helped us maintain our levels and hopefully great for us as it helps us maintain the rhythm. The Brentford game will be different, the way both teams play. It will sustain the demanding effort.”

Meanwhile, Guardiola gave an update on the fresh wave of injuries which have affected the squad this week, and the Catalan confirmed no-one has definitely been ruled out of the weekend game in West London. Four City players were forced to sit out the trip to Brighton & Hove Albion, while two more had to come with knocks in the second half of that game.

It brings the number of City players who are doubts for Sunday’s game up to seven, which is a concern ahead of the FA Cup final next week.

As for Brentford, most of the talk has centred around Ivan Toney ahead of the game, with the FA providing more details on the striker’s offences after last week he was banned from football for eight months for breaching betting rules.

Gareth Southgate said earlier this week that Toney should receive more support, something Brentford manager Thomas Frank agreed with. “Definitely, I am bang on with Gareth there, it was a fantastic point he made,” said the Dane.

“Ivan did something wrong, he got punished for it. What I don’t get at all is how can you let him not be involved in football for the first four months. What do you gain from that? If you want to rehabilitate people, give them education. Now it is die or survive.”

Toney is one of five Brentford players who won’t be available against City, and here’s the full list of absentees from both camps…

“It is meaningless in terms of points, but the way we played against Brighton, it doesn’t mean that. Brighton [on Wednesday] helped us maintain our levels and hopefully great for us as it helps us maintain the rhythm. The Brentford game will be different, the way both teams play. It will sustain the demanding effort.”