Wolves v MAN CITY: The PREVIEW – City’s Probable Team

With the incredible 6-1 victory at Old Trafford still sinking in, it’s time to momentarily shift our focus away from the Premier League and concentrate on another trophy. Whilst the Carling Cup isn’t exactly top of our priorities this season, it’s a chance to win silverware and that opportunity should never be sniffed at. Having defeated Birmingham comfortably in the last round, we travel to Molineux to face Wolves with a quarter final place up for grabs.

They were defeated at this stage last year by Manchester United, so judging by recent results, we should knock quite a few past them! But football doesn’t work like that and we’ll have to be on our guard. Both sides will make numerous changes and whichever is affected to a lesser extent will, in all likelihood, win the game. We play Wolves again on Saturday, this time in the Premier League, so it would be nice to head into that fixture with a victory tomorrow.

As stated above, Roberto Mancini will make changes. For the last round, he made eleven of them and I wouldn’t be surprised to see that number again. Players like Kolo Touré and Adam Johnson are on the fringes of the first team and will hope to send a message to Mancini, whilst it’s also an opportunity to give more experience to the likes of Abdul Razak. Unfortunately, Owen Hargreaves is injured and won’t play, but Nigel De Jong needs match fitness and I’d expect him to start.

Here is the side Mancini could select:

Wolves have struggled in the league so far and their boss, Mick McCarthy reacted angrily when fans booed his team at the weekend. With the pressure on domestically, I’m sure they will rotate a number of players, although their reserves don’t quite have the same quality as ours!

Referee: Neil Swarbrick – He’s from Preston and this is his first season officiating in the Premier League. Officiated in our Carling Cup exit last season to West Brom.

Prediction: Wolves 1 – 3 MAN CITY – Our reserves should have more than enough quality to deal with the home side, so I’m backing us to progress. Goals to be scored by Adam Hammill, Adam Johnson and a brace from Edin Dzeko.