Man City to edge epic first leg with Real Madrid
A mouth-watering semi-final first leg is in prospect at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday evening when Real Madrid come to town to take on Manchester City. The hosts eliminated current La Liga holders and the visitors' city rivals Atlético in the quarters, and maintain a slender lead in the Premier League. The visitors are certain to take the domestic title back and will go toe-to-toe with Pep Guardiola's charges over 180 minutes of football (or more). Read our preview here:
Precious Rúben
Guardiola revealed last week the sheer scale of the work done by the club's senior physio department to keep his players out of the treatment room for too long. Tomorrow evening, he is only without João Cancelo for certain, and that is down to suspension. One of John Stones and Kyle Walker will take the right-back berth with Nathan Aké on the opposite flank. The defensive personnel will be extremely important, so Rúben Dias' return to fitness last week is timely to say the least. He will have to do what almost nobody has managed to do this term: keep Karim Benzema off the scoresheet. Four-goal forward Gabriel Jesus will probably have to settle for a place on the bench despite that haul in the 5-1 thrashing of Watford on Saturday.
Viní: Veni, Vidi, Vici?
With only the perennially injured Eden Hazard unavailable, Carlo Ancelotti will be backing his side to dump out a second English club en route to the final, which will be against either a third one (Liverpool) or Villarreal (7th and 26 points behind them). Los Blancos almost never sit back, but might need to exercise more caution and patience than they showed against Chelsea to go back to the Bernabéu with something. Benzema has simply been unplayable in 2021/2022, but he is far from the only threat in attack. Vinícius Júnior has a goal every other game from 28 league appearances and more pertinently, transforms into joint supplier in chief at the elite table alongside the evergreen Luka Modrić. Whoever does line up at right-back for the hosts will be stretched to their limits.
Betting tip
City need to take an advantage on aggregate with them to Madrid. Real are never down and out of games and ties they're losing on the rare occasions that occurs. It will however be a tall order to do so without conceding; Parimatch have odds of 3.10 for a home win with both teams scoring.
