Enzo Maresca's Manchester City players will be sporting a brand new kit for the very first time this weekend when they face Aston Villa at Villa Park in the Premier League, it has been confirmed.
MATCH PREVIEW: Aston Villa vs Manchester City (Premier League)
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The current Premier League leaders travel to the Midlands with the intention of further extending their hugely impressive start to the brand new English top-flight season, despite the ongoing legal situation concerning financial rule breaches ongoing in the background.
Thanks to a 3-2 win over top-flight newcomers Ipswich Town in their last Premier League outing, Enzo Maresca became the first manager in the competition's history to win all seven of his opening matches in charge of a new club.
And that fine form was carried on into midweek UEFA Champions League action, as Phil Foden continued his own scoring excellence by building upon a first goal for the club in 307 days with a stellar hat-trick against AEK Athens in a 5-1 home victory.
Unai Emery's Aston Villa will almost certainly provide a much sterner test for Manchester City in comparison to the Greek champions, and Enzo Maresca will be well aware of the need for a complete performance if his side are to claim another three points.
After a string of changes to the Manchester City starting line-up against Ipswich Town and AEK Athens in the last two matches, a much more predictable 11 is expected at Villa Park, but there will still be a notable change in the kit department.
Man City to debut brand new kit against Aston Villa
As confirmed by Manchester City in the build-up to their trip to Birmingham on Saturday afternoon, Enzo Maresca's players will debut the club's 2026/27 third kit in the Premier League against Aston Villa.
Interestingly, the kit was also a first in professional football, as fans of the Etihad Stadium club were handed the ability to design kits using PUMA AI Creator - a custom generative AI tool turning prompts into shirt designs.
And following a fan vote in January 2025, what is now Manchester City's official 2026/27 third kit emerged successful, with the winning design seeing a white base split by a central two-tone sash of half sky blue and half navy running the length of the shirt.
How did Man City select their brand new AI kit?
First launched in December 2024, PUMA AI Creator enabled Manchester City fans to take control of the future of the club's kits by submitting prompts and utilising editing tools to create their desired strips.
Manchester City would later announce that submissions arrived from over 200 countries, resulting in over 180,000 unique shirts, and leading to 1.7 million platform ratings where the 10 most popular kits were shortlisted for a fan vote.