Pep Guardiola has made wholesale changes for Manchester City‘s FA Cup tie against Newcastle.
Man City travel to St. James’ Park for the fifth round tie and then four days later are in the Santiago Bernabeu for a Champions League last-16 first-leg showdown with Real Madrid.
Guardiola’s side have already booked a place in the Carabao Cup final, against Arsenal, and remain in the Premier League title race which means an unprecedented quadruple is achievable.
Despite no let-up in the fixture schedule, the Man City boss has stressed the importance of the FA Cup, thus hinting at going strong against the Magpies.
“How many finals did we play in the last years? How many semi-finals? A lot, that means always FA Cup is so important,” Guardiola told reporters on Friday.
“We are going to travel to Newcastle to win and get to the next round.
“That’s definitely 100%.”
Sticking to his policy of rotating goalkeepers for the cup competitions, Guardiola hands James Trafford a start as Gianluigi Donnarumma is rested.
Trafford impressed in both Carabao Cup semi-final ties against Newcastle, keeping a clean sheet in the first-leg at St. James’ Park as City ran out 2-0 winners.
Antoine Semenyo was on the scoresheet that night but drops down to the bench, with Omar Marmoush coming into the side given his impressive record against the Magpies.
Erling Haaland is fit after shaking off a minor knock that kept him out of the win over Leeds but he is not in the squad at all. Nico O’Reilly does start after sitting out the 2-2 draw with Nottingham Forest.
There are changes in central defence with Abdukodir Khusanov selected to help combat Newcastle’s pacy forward line and he partners John Stones.
CONFIRMED TEAM NEWS
Man City XI: Trafford, Nunes, Khusanov, Stones (C), Ake, Nico, Reijnders, O’Reilly, Savinho, Doku, Marmoush
Subs: Donnarumma, Dias, Cherki, Guéhi, Rodri, Bernardo, Ait-Nouri, Semenyo, Foden
