Vitor Pereira working to crack the 'Da Vinci Code' as Wolves take on Manchester City

The head coach will pit his wits against the Spaniard for just the second time in his career tonight, after their 2011 meeting between Porto and Barcelona.

Pereira suffered a 2-0 loss that day in the European Super Cup and 14 years later the Wolves head coach was full of praise for his dugout adversary.

"Pep is a top, world class manager," Pereira said.

"I admire him because he's a manager that's a Da Vinci in football. He's looking for the future and tries to reinvent football, to bring new ideas.

"He isn't afraid to try and for me, he's a special, special, special manager."

Wolves are on a six-game winning run that they hope will be extended at the Etihad.

But Pereira says he is still perfecting his playing style at Wolves which he insists must be ambitious.

"As a player I had ideas about a game with quality," Pereira added.

"It means, in my mind, when I start to be a coach I want (the team) to reflect my personality a little bit.

"I want to create a game with quality, aggression with and without the ball, dominating.

"When I started to work as a coach, I coached Porto's youth teams and I had the best players in the country working in the way I wanted to play.

"I tried everything to create beautiful football, winning titles, and if you look at my career almost all the time I was playing for titles.

"But when you come to the Premier League you want to create a team and style that is not for a small team, but for a big team.

"This my step, at Wolves I want to create a quality style of play."