Eddie Howe says what is difficult about preparing for Manchester City ahead of tomorrow's Carabao Cup clash
Newcastle United continue the defence of their Carabao Cup crown tomorrow night as Manchester City come to St James' Park for the first leg of the semi-final. Kick-off is at 8pm, and the game is live on Sky Sports and ITV.
Manchester City will join Newcastle in the draw for the FA Cup fourth round tonight after seeing off Exeter City 10-1 on Saturday, which bodes well, doesn't it?
In truth, it was always going to be a tough ask to beat Manchester City over two legs, regardless of how high their confidence is, and Tuesday night's game is going to be a huge test for this newly resilient Toon.
Eddie Howe spoke to the media this morning ahead of tomorrow's game, and he's spoken about how he'd prefer to have the home leg second, and we would certainly agree with that.
Eddie Howe says it's difficult to prepare a team to take on Manchester City
Howe went on to say how it's so difficult to prepare for a game against City because they have so many options available to them.
"The natural preference is for the home game to be the second leg but it's not like that this time. We need to use the home crowd to our advantage in the first game to try and impose ourselves on the tie. We really enjoyed the two-legged semi-final last year but this is going to be a totally different challenge. Man City are the hardest team in the country to play over two legs.
"We will have to be at our best to get through.They are a difficult team to prepare for because they change and tinker a lot with the tactical set up they have. Difficult team to read but we will have our plans in place and our priority is always ourselves, what we can do and how we can hurt them. It is important in the home game that we are ourselves."
If we are going to defend our crown we're going to have to do it the hard way
Where Pep Guardiola has many options for his team, Eddie Howe may be struggling to cobble a good team together. At least one comprising of fully-fit players.
So many of Howe's squad have been involved in epic battles this last week, while others are being forced into games despite not being fully match-fit.
But this is Newcastle United, and we don't like to do things the easy way!
