Manchester City riddled with injuries ahead of derby day

Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini has confirmed that the quartet of David Silva, Sergio Aguero, Fabian Delph, and Gael Clichy all remain absent for the trip to arch rival Manchester United on Sunday, while Samir Nasri could be unavailable until Nov. 21.

Nasri has taken a more peripheral role this campaign as he continues to struggle with a niggling hamstring injury. He has managed just two starts so far in the 2015-16 season.

"It will be difficult for Samir Nasri to return before the international break," Pellegrini revealed at Friday's pre-match press conference. "I hope he will be back after those 10 days."

When the players return from international duty, the first game is a visit from nearby Liverpool.

Despite the busy treatment room at the Etihad Campus, Pellegrini is confident his side can cope.

"You never know, we hope to see a lot of goals, the most important thing is to try and win the game," the Chilean said. "There are different ways to try to win, I think we have one, I hope for fans it's a good show and good game."

He said his side has dealt well with a lengthy injury list before, and cited James Milner's successful yet brief spell up front last season as an example. With his versatile squad, he believes he can work around the loss of influential duo Silva and Aguero.

"(Last season) our team scored 15 goals without strikers. We have players with characteristics that can play different ways, and every one of them can score."

Kevin De Bruyne, a £54-million summer acquisition from Wolfsburg, is one player who can play a variety of positions and is likely to be given the nod to spearhead the Citizens' attack.

"I think we just have to go there and play our own game and not change a thing - we are an attacking team so I don't think we should change our way of playing for anyone," the Belgian told the club website.

City's trip to Old Trafford on Sunday will mark the 170th installment of the Manchester derby.