Hello and welcome to the official Not606 match thread for Wednesday's Carling Cup semi-final 1st leg encounter between Manchester City & Liverpool. The game will be available to watch on BBC1 and BBC Radio Five Live will have a radio commentary. The build-up on BBC1 will begin at 7.30 and the build-up on 5 Live will begin at 7PM. Preview. It might only be early January but we've already got domestic cup semi finals upon us. The Carling Cup is belittled by many but i'm sure the four clubs still invovled in the competition will be taking it very seriously indeed. On Tuesday, Cardiff City & Crystal Palace meet at Selhurst Park in the all-Championship semi-final. However, it's Wednesday's semi-final first leg which i'm going to talk about. Manchester City & Liverpool will meet on Wednesday night in a highly-anticipated game for both sides. With Manchester City looking to reach the final for the first time since 1976 and Liverpool looking to get into the final for the 11th time, it is a massive game for both sides. The home side, Manchester City, have had to get past some strong teams to get to this stage. City's Carling Cup run began with a 2-0 victory over Championship side Birmingham. A goal on his debut for former Manchester United midfielder Owen Hargreaves and a goal for Mario Balotelli set City on their way in this competition. They were then drawn against another Midlands side in Wolves. A 7 goal thriller followed with a 5-2 victory for the Manchester club. Wolves went ahead in that game but the attacking qualities of City tore the Wolves defence apart and they got 5 without reply. A late goal for Wolves didn't take anything off a good performance for City's fringe players. These results had got them into the quarter-finals and a tasty looking tie with Arsenal was the reward. Arsenal looked good in this game and had thier chances but a breakaway goal in the 83rd minute from Sergio Aguero got City through into the semi-finals. So far in this competition, Roberto Mancini has blended in a mix of first-team and fringe players but with City only two games away from another Wembley appearance, will Mancini continue with this? Somehow, I don't think he will. The away side, Liverpool have taken this competition very seriously so far. With no European football for Liverpool this season, an extra inportance was placed on the two domestic cups. Because Liverpool don't have European football this season, we started in this competition a round early. The first game of our Carling Cup campaign was a tie at League 1 Exeter. Will a full house at St. James Park, Liverpool needed to be professional. They were. A strong team was put out and Liverpool came through 3-1. Goals from Luis Suarez, Maxi Rodriguez & Andy Carroll pushed Liverpool into the third round. The draw gave Liverpool an away tie at Brighton. With Brighton riding high in the Championship and the Amex stadium giving Brighton a lift, this was another potential banana-skin for Kenny Dalglish's side. Craig Bellamy was making his first start and was excellent as he scored and set up the second for Dirk Kuyt to put away. A late goal from Brighton wasn't enough and Liverpool went through 2-1. This hard fought victory set up a tie away at Stoke City. Liverpool went behind in this game to a Kenwyne Jones goal but a excellent double from Luis Suarez made sure that Liverpool avenged their 1-0 loss in the league at the Britannia Stadium. A quater-final tie with Chelsea at Stamford Bridge followed. Having beaten Chelsea 2-1 in the league 9 days earlier, confidence was high on the part of Liverpool. Despite Andy Carroll missing a penalty, goals from Maxi Rodriguez and a first ever Liverpool goal for Martin Kelly capped off a solid performance from us and put us through to the semi-finals. Liverpool have taken this competition seriously so far and I don't expect that to change. We lost 3-0 to City in the league on the 2nd of January, lessons will have to have been learnt if Liverpool are to go into the second leg with a chance. Injury News. Manchester City. Edin Dzeko- Knee Injury. Mario Balotelli- Ankle/Foot Injury City also have Kolo and Yaya Toure away at the African Cup Of Nations so they are unavailable. Vincent Kompany is suspended for four games starting with this semi-final first leg. Liverpool. Lucas Leiva- ACL Knee Injury. Luis Suarez is serving the third of his eight game suspension so is unavailable. Manchester City 0 - 1 Liverpool Goalscorers: Liverpool... Steven Gerrard: 12th minute. (Penalty) Manchester City: Hart Richards Lescott Savic Kolarov Clichy Barry Milner Nasri Dzeko Aguero SUBS: Pantilimon Zabaleta Onuoha De Jong Hargreaves Balotelli Adam Johnson Mario Balotelli coming off and Samir Nasri is on. Nigel De Jong coming off and Alexander Kolarov is on. Adam Johnson coming off and Edin Dzeko is on. Liverpool: Reina Glen Johnson Skrtel Kelly Agger Carragher Enrique Adam Gerrard Henderson Carroll SUBS: Doni Coates Spearing Downing Shelvey Bellamy Kuyt Jay Spearing coming off and Charlie Adam is on. Stewart Downing coming off and Jose Enrique is on. Craig Bellamy coming off and Jamie Carragher is on. YNWA.
Not sure about this one. We will have to up our game from last time. Doesnt help they just lost either.
Dont fancy going to Anfield with anything less than a 2 goal cushion,it's hardly a happy hunting ground.Will Dalglish play as open as he did in the league game or treat it like a European game and keep it tight with the aim of a second leg onslaught? Being without Kompany and Yaya toure more or less equals the loss of Suarez and Lucas from the Liverpool side and it could well come down to who defends the better to get through to Wembley and be warm favourites to win it. The team I think city will play is Hart Zabaleta Richards Lescott Clichy De Jong Barry Johnson. Milner silva Aguero Subs; Pants Savic Hargreaves Nasri Kolorov Dzeko Razak Presume Liverpool will play Carroll up top on his own so I'd put Richards on him to negate the aerial threat and play de Jong and Barry to shield the back 4 from Gerrards runs. Milner was excellent against the rags and should be given yayas role as he's our best bet as a box to box player not that yaya ever bothered to track back
Bellamy and Stevie have to start. We need to be much tighter than last time - such a shame Lucas is out. Try and nick a goal and bring it back to Anfield for a good old punch up. Need to make sure we're still in it by then!
Aye, some people still wont recognise what a huge loss lucas is, saying that though city are without key players so it is no excuse for either team.
They have cover though. Ours is reasonable, but not great. Adam and Henderson are off form atm. Interesting to see if Carroll and Downing can kick on. Bellamy was excellent on the right wing the other night. I'd be tempted to stick him on the right, Downing on the left and Adam and Spearing in the middle: --------------------------Reina----------------------------- Johnson----------Skert-----------Agger-------------Jose ------------------Adam------------Spearing-------------- Bellamy-----------------Gerrard-----------------Downing --------------------------Carroll-------------------------- This would give pace and direct play. Bellamy is key to this game imo. His and Gerrard can get them on the counter and put the ball on a plate for Carroll, if not score themselves.
a few serious points.. 1. the pitch got very heavy and a bit cut up on sunday. It may not be the best this wednesday we will have to wait and see. 2. city played ten men including their best players like aguero, milner (for running alone) and so forth. they may have just a few heavy legs this week 3. a few ducks were broken on firday... downing and carrol just might play a bit better this time round.... then again maybe not!
is it cos you think city will be out to right a wrong and get back on track while liverpool are itching to get thier own back on city as well? Is it cos we will not see komany, toures or maybe not barry? everything is converging towards a classic... so i predicted a draw.
Looking forward to the game, Gerrard to start but I'm not sure who we should drop. Henderson has been good and Adam is not playing well. Midfield for me -----Spearing----- Gerrard--- Henderson
I know we got tonked in the League game but football is such a funny game defined by small margins. Downing scores and the complexion of the game changes. I remember Chelsea beating us home and away and in the League cup final only for Liverpool to do them one in the CL. Without Yaya and Kompany there is not a good day to go and get a result. Hope Nasri plays coz boy is he a pussy.
you might be right, i don't know if gerrard playing v oldham and bellamy too means they won't start... then you add in downing issue and I wonder what we'll do.... undecided over here
