Real Football Man All of the Football, All of the time
Manchester City boss Manuel Pellegrini says Willy Caballero will take over from Joe Hart in goal for Wednesday’s League Cup semi-final second leg.
Eliaquim Mangala, Vincent Kompany, Aleksandar Kolarov, Wilfried Bony and Samir Nasri remain sidelined.
Everton, will be without two key players.
Midfielder Muhamed Besic (hamstring) and winger Kevin Mirallas (tendon) suffered injuries in the Premier League defeat against Swansea on Sunday.
Editor’s Note: Everton take a slender advantage into the Second Leg of their Capital One Cup Semi Final clash with Manchester City, in what by their standards has been a season of underachievement in the League this is a key game for Roberto Martinez as he needs to placate an ever growing frustrated group of Everton fans.
They travel to Manchester City with a 2-1 lead from 3 weeks ago but the trip to the Etihad will not be an easy one, these two sides met a fortnight ago in the League at The Etihad and played out a 0-0 stalemate, this is the 3rd match in this January series and City are yet to come out on top a score they will be looking to settle this evening.
Again City’s stuttering form is stopping them from sitting at the top of the Premier League, it seems to be a Win and then a Draw and then repeat. They did move up to 2nd at the weekend thanks to Arsenal’s defeat but were certainly made to work for a point at Upton Park. But one major plus point is that Sergio Aguero looks back to his best with Saturday seeing another brace for the diminutive Argentine.
With the Centre Back partnership of Nicolas Otamendi and Martin Demichelis set to start Tonight Everton and more importantly Romelu Lukaku will certainly fancy their chances but The Toffees have to be mindful that they have a porous Defence themselves, one that has seen them concede 34 goals in the League this season almost undoing all their hard work at the other end in which they have managed to score 40. Quite an incredible amount for a side that finds themselves 12th in the table.
I documented the pressure that Roberto Martinez finds himself under on Monday, an article you can read here:
http://realfootballman.com/2016/01/25/roberto-martinezs-toffees-becoming-a-bit-unstuck-this-season/
As for Tonight, I think City who are still on for a potential quadruple won’t want to give up that opportunity but Everton do have a habit of raising the performance for the big game occasions. For Everton’s it’s probably the easiest route into Europe as the League campaign is almost all but written off but unfortunately for them I think it will be City who progress and putting stop to an all Merseyside Final.
