Man City are in 11th place and a win would only ensure they overtake one team: Paris St-Germain or Newcastle, who play each other.
Either they need at least two other teams above them to make a mistake, from third-placed Real Madrid on down, or win by a margin greater than two: Chelsea, Barcelona and Sporting. Manchester City’s goal difference is no more than two goals worse than those teams, but they are also the lowest scorers of the quartet, so they have work to do to ensure any tiebreaker scenario is in their favor.
City may only need to catch one of those teams if PSG vs Newcastle ends in a draw, as City would then surpass both of them. As always, there is an important caveat in all this: Pep Guardiola’s team must protect itself against Atlético de Madrid and/or Atalanta that surpasses them on goal difference or goals scored.
Atlético are a particular threat as their goal difference is only one inferior and they have scored three more goals than City.
One point could still be enough for City to avoid a two-legged play-off, but they would, improbably, need at least seven more results to go their way, including (most likely) defeats by at least three of the five teams immediately above. With PSG and Newcastle playing each other, only a maximum of four of those five can lose.
It is possible that Manchester City will occupy the last automatic qualification spot even if they lose, but that would require a series of results too fanciful for even the most optimistic City fan.
Did you know?
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This will be the first meeting between both teams and the first time that Guardiola faces Galatasaray.
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The last English team to beat Galatasaray in the Champions League was Arsenal in December 2014 (4-1). Since then, the Turkish team is unbeaten in three meetings against English opponents in the competition (2 wins and 1 draw), including a 1-0 victory over Liverpool earlier this season.
