It is not often in recent years that City approach a Manchester derby with as much trepidation as United. But the hosts at the Etihad on Sunday have just as many reasons – if not more – to fret over a game both managers could really do without.

The timing is rotten for Pep Guardiola and Ruben Amorim. Coming on the back of a post-transfer window international break, the preparation for derby no.197 will be sub-optimal for both sides even before you begin to consider the wider contexts. And those wider contexts give Guardiola more grounds for concern than Amorim.

Pep’s big worry: a title race in which City are already struggling with the pace in the wake of the worst start to a season in his managerial career.

It is not an unrealistic prospect that City could be nine points behind Liverpool and seven off Chelsea by Sunday evening. The Reds and Blues face opponents fancied by many to struggle this season. That those teams, Burnley and Brentford, are on the same number of points as Guardiola’s men is a damning indictment on City, even at this early stage.

That is what Guardiola will have spent most of the last fortnight stewing over. The City boss flew to New York for the US Open but he must have been preoccupied at Flushing Meadows by the thought of City pulling the chain on their title prospects with a derby repeat of the performances that reaped no points from Tottenham or Brighton.

City were not especially wretched in either defeat. But more worrying for Guardiola than those performances in isolation is the absence of the aura that made them so dominant for so long.

Guardiola would have hoped that last season was but a blip and that a summer reset, even around the FIFA Club World Cup, would give City a more familiar air of superiority, if not yet infallibility.

But Tottenham and Brighton proved that the rest of the Premier League won’t simply get down on their knees again.

Spurs are City’s weird kryptonite, but there was still an added zip and swagger about Thomas Frank’s side at the Etihad, especially on the break, that portrayed an absolute confidence that the hosts were vulnerable.

At the AmEx, City assumed the control that Guardiola so craves before they relinquished it whole. And all it took was a quadruple substitution. After that, Brighton unleashed a storm on their visitors that the City of old would usually weather with little inconvenience. But this version of City, one evidently still traumatised and in transition, wilted.

“We forgot to play,” as Pep put it and his four changes – two doubles – to counter Brighton’s, initially to steady the ship and then to stop it sinking, failed to have the desired effect.

More lasting changes came in the following days, with Ilkay Gundogan, Manuel Akanji and Ederson waved off, the trio following Kevin De Bruyne, Kyle Walker and Jack Grealish through the exit. It is a turnover that City planned for – most of it, at least – but one that sees a lot of stoic experience leave a dressing room already on the back foot.

Such an overhaul prompts immediate questions over how Guardiola reacts to two defeats before a game that looks more than ever like a must-not-lose affair.

Does Gianluigi Donnarumma make a derby debut after barely a few days in Manchester, immediately putting James Trafford’s nose out of joint? Donnarumma arrives in England after conceding four to Israel while getting away with punching a corner into his own net amid scathing reviews of his performance.

Might it be an overhauled defence in front of whichever under-pressure keeper Guardiola goes with? There are question marks over the right-back and at least one of his centre-backs.

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What form does City’s midfield take? And can Jeremy Doku be trusted to supplement Erling Haaland’s goal threat with Omar Marmoush injured?

Guardiola is accustomed to making big decisions, but these are strange times for the City boss amid unfamiliar uncertainty over his options. And not often have there been so many to ponder at once.

Which ought to empower Amorim and United to go to the Etihad on Sunday to follow Spurs and Brighton’s lead. The United boss won and drew his first two Manchester derbies, with 180 minutes of wretched mediocrity punctuated only by City caving in on themselves in the final minutes on their own patch.

Amorim has plenty to ponder himself. Which goalkeeper gets the gloves? Are Matheus Cunha and Mason Mount fit? The outcome of those health checks will likely hold considerable sway in whether Bruno Fernandes remains in a deeper role alongside Casemiro.

Whatever decisions Amorim takes, the United boss should be picking up the scent of blood wafting on the air from east Manchester. The Red Devils remain vulnerable enough to justifiably feel that a point would be a satisfactory outcome, but on Sunday, they have the opportunity to secure some respite from the harsh spotlight and thrust it upon their neighbours.