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9 min: Fulham have made 20 successful passes in the opposition’s final third, as opposed to Newcastle’s two. However, stats are worth very little, and …
8 min: Jimenez makes a nuisance of himself in the Newcastle box, but skittles over a defender. Free kick. But Fulham come again, Jimenez nearly finding Smith Rowe free in the box with a cleverly directed header down the inside-right channel. Thiaw comes across to cover and clear.
6 min: NEW 0-0 FUL. Lukic sends Kevin into space down the left. The exotically monickered Brazilian flies down the left and wins a corner, but Wilson’s delivery is not all that.
4 min: NEW 0-0 FUL. Fulham have started confidently enough. No real early drama to report, though.
HALF TIME: Manchester City 1-0 Brentford
City lead thanks to Cherki’s glorious curler. Abdukodir Khusanov is lucky to still be on the pitch, though, having denied Kevin Schade a goalscoring opportunity.
2 min: NEW 0-0 FUL. An early corner at St James’ Park for Fulham. The holders deal with it easily enough. Fulham are wearing a neon-green away kit. Stabilo Boss should sue.
Meanwhile up at St James’ Park … Newcastle United v Fulham kicks off. Part two of our SuperClocko™ patented Three-Half MBM Fiasco-in-the-making© is go!
45 min: There will be three additional first-half minutes.
44 min: It’s pretty quiet at the Etihad. O’Reilly, perhaps lulled into a false sense of security, plays a dreadfully lazy backpass down the Brentford left, nearly letting Schade free on goal. This time Khusanov is the hero, sliding in to flick the ball back to Trafford just in time.
42 min: Yarmoliuk tries to release Damsgaard into the City box down the right. Khusanov gets ahead of the striker, but doesn’t deal with the situation, and Brentford are gifted a corner. Nothing comes of the set piece, City’s young defender getting away with more uncertainty. This hasn’t been a banner performance from Khusanov, who probably should already be in the bath.
40 min: The rain continues to sheet down. “The rain in Manchester won’t bother those away fans who’ve spent their lives at a bus stop in Hounslow,” argues Justin Kavanagh. “Nor their Dublin-born manager.”
38 min: Brentford started brightly, but they’re boxed in now. Cherki floats a wedge down the inside-right channel to find Foden in the box. Foden telescopes a leg to take the ball under control, but seems undecided over what do next. Flick over the keeper’s head? Or swivel and shoot? In the end he does neither, though his brief display of skilled juggling registers seven-and-a-half out of ten on our Jim-Baxter-o-meter™. Entertaining nonetheless, in other words.
36 min: Cherki really hit that, though. The pace of the shot made for a doubly delicious aesthetic treat, as the ball hit the top-right corner of the back of the net, dropping down onto the pole at the bottom before whistling back out of the goal and past the prone keeper at high speed. Such a sweet goal.
34 min: Cherki steals his team-mate Erling Haaland’s meditation celebration. On the City bench, the man himself cracks a smile of medium-to-high amusement.
GOAL! Manchester City 1-0 Brentford (Cherki 32)
The corner, in from the right, is half cleared. The ball drops to Cherki on the left-hand edge of the D. Cherki takes a touch back infield, and whips a power-curler into the top right. No chance for the keeper! A sumptuous finish.
31 min: Savinho bursts past Kayode down the left and reaches the byline. His cross isn’t all that, but takes a deflection and loops erratically enough to force Henry to head behind. And from the corner …
29 min: Henry scampers down the inside-left channel and into the City box. He’s about to deliver a cross when Lewis slides in to dispossess with a perfectly-timed tackle. It had to be just so, or the referee was pointing to the spot. Magnificent defending.
28 min: Mukasa shifts the ball in from the right and has a blast. Straight into the nearest red-and-white shirt. City are certainly looking the more threatening, though most of their efforts are long-distance affairs. Brentford holding them at arm’s length in that sense.
26 min: Cherki looks in the mood, and now he dances in from the left, elegantly winning a corner. The set piece is worked back to Reijnders, who screeches a volley over the bar from the edge of the D. It’s beginning to feel like a City goal may not be too far off.
24 min: Brentford gift Cherki far too much time and space in the middle of the park, 30 yards from goal. Cherki creams a rising shot towards the top right. Valdimarsson parries, but not in particularly convincing style. He does just enough to stop the shot, and the ball squirts away from danger.
23 min: Schade is caught offside yet again, this time down the right. Keep making those runs, though, and something may just come off for him.
22 min: Savinho cuts in from the left and exchanges cute little passes with Foden and Cherki. Eventually he finds himself in a pocket of space just ahead of the D but slices wildly right of goal.
21 min: Foden is immediately in the thick of the action, patrolling Bobb’s beat down the right. His dinked cross is intercepted by Ajer and cleared.
20 min: Jensen takes the free kick, whipping fiercely towards the top-right corner. It’s not quite high enough to cause Trafford bother, and the keeper confidently punches clear.
19 min: Before the game restarts, Bobb goes down, having felt something. He trudges off sadly, the poor young man having no luck with injury whatsoever. Foden comes on in his place.
18 min: City and Khusanov have got away with a huge one there. Had that been a further 20 yards from goal, you could have made a case for Ake getting back and dealing with the situation. But Schade was about to enter the box and shoot. Ake didn’t have time to recover. Brentford are fuming. There’ll be VAR in the semis onwards, but that doesn’t help them now.
16 min: Schade dinks the ball past Khusanov down the inside-right channel. He’s about to enter the box when Khusanov shoulder barges him to the floor from behind. A free kick and a booking, but Brentford are claiming it should be a red card, due to the denial of a goalscoring opportunity. They’ve got a point. Ake was close by, but he would have been behind Schade. No VAR, so Brentford’s anger is for nought.
15 min: Bobb dribbles in from the right, having got the run on Henry. He’s got space and time, and options in the middle. He opts to drop a shoulder, nudge further infield, and zip a shot towards the bottom right. He scuffs it a bit, and that’s an easy claim for the keeper. City suddenly baring their fangs.
13 min: Reijnders releases Savinho into space on the left. Savinho’s low cross is no good, but the ball ends up with Cherki, to the right of the D. Cherki drags a low drive wide right. Well hit, but Valdimarsson had it covered.
12 min: Henry volleys a first-time pass down the left, in the hope of releasing Schade into the box. Again Schade’s timing is off; had he been smarter, he’d have been in on goal. Brentford will be pleased with their start.
10 min: Yarmoliuk pings a clever pass down the inside-right channel to release Schade, but the flag correctly pops up for offside. There wasn’t much air between attacker and defender, and a better-timed burst from Schade would have had the hosts in all sorts. This game is slowly beginning to open up.
9 min: Savinho wrestles his way past Kayode and prepares to tear off into space down the left. But the whistle goes rather easily. There wasn’t much in that, and City are denied a dangerous attack.
8 min: Khusanov jumps in late from behind into Henry, who is in mid-air and crashes to the floor. A slightly saucy deed. Just a free kick, though you’ve seen yellows given for less. Nothing comes of the set piece.
6 min: Cherki executes his first, but almost certainly not his last, cheeky backheel of the evening. But it doesn’t release Lewis down the right. Soon the ball’s back at the feet of Trafford, who launches long. Bobb threatens to get in behind Henry, but the Brentford defender turns on the jets to win the footrace and head back to his keeper Valdimarsson.
4 min: BREAKING NEWS: It’s raining in Manchester. Meanwhile only a gentle rumble in the stands, with nothing much happening yet.
2 min: Brentford win an early throw deep in City territory on the left. Kayode does what he does, flinging long into the box. City clear, but Brentford come again and win another throw on the left. This time Kayode does what he usually doesn’t, restarting short and setting up Janelt to cross. City deal with that as well. Brentford mixing it up early doors.
Manchester City v Brentford is go. The visitors get the ball rolling.
The teams are out at the Etihad. Manchester City wear their famous sky blue, while Brentford are in their first-choice kit of red and white stripes. Half One of SuperClocko™’s patented Three-Half MBM System© gets underway in a couple of minutes!
The holders Newcastle make six changes to the side that began the 1-0 defeat at Sunderland. Fabian Schär, Jacob Murphy, Harvey Barnes, Joe Willock, Jacob Ramsey and Yoane Wissa are in; Sandro Tonali, Anthony Gordon, Anthony Elanga and Nick Woltemade drop to the bench, while Dan Burn and Lewis Hall are injured. Wissa is making his first start for his new club.
Fulham make four changes to the XI that started the 3-2 win at Burnley, and three of them are enforced. Alex Iwobi, Samuel Chukwueze and Calvin Bassey are all away at the Afcon with Nigeria, so in come Jorge Cuenca, Saša Lukić and Kevin. Meanwhile Benjamin Lecomte replaces Bernd Leno in goal.
Newcastle v Fulham teams
Newcastle United: Ramsdale, Jacob Murphy, Thiaw, Schar, Livramento, Miley, Guimaraes, Ramsey, Barnes, Wissa, Willock.
Subs: Ruddy, Joelinton, Tonali, Gordon, Elanga, Woltemade, Alex Murphy, Neave, Shahar.
Fulham: Lecomte, Tete, Andersen, Cuenca, Robinson, Berge, Lukic, Wilson, Smith Rowe, Kevin, Jimenez.
Subs: Leno, Castagne, Diop, Reed, Cairney, King, Ridgeon, Traore, Kusi-Asare.
Referee: Darren England (South Yorkshire).
Manchester City name the same League Cup team they selected at Swansea City in the previous round, with the exceptions of the injured Jeremy Doku and the Afcon-bound pair of Rayan Ait-Nouri and Omar Marmoush. Still plenty of attacking power in the shape of Rayan Cherki and Savinho, but just in case things go belly up, Erling Haaland, Bernardo Silva and Phil Foden are on the bench.
Brentford also mix it up, with only five players from XI that started the 1-1 Premier League draw with Leeds on Sunday starting again tonight. Michael Kayode, Mathias Jensen, Vitaly Janelt, Sepp van den Berg, and captain Nathan Collins keep their places. Jordan Henderson and Igor Thiago are missing altogether, as is Dango Ouattara who is off to Afcon.
Man City v Brentford teams
Manchester City: Trafford, Lewis, Khusanov, Ake, O’Reilly, Gonzalez, Reijnders, Savio, Cherki, Bobb, Mukasa.
Subs: Donnarumma, Dias, Haaland, Silva, Gvardiol, Matheus Luiz, Foden, Mfuni, Gray.
Brentford: Valdimarsson, Kayode, Ajer, Collins, van den Berg, Henry, Yarmolyuk, Janelt, Jensen, Damsgaard, Schade.
Subs: Kelleher, Hickey, Pinnock, Lewis-Potter, Peart-Harris, Konak, Nunes Gomes, Arthur, Donovan.
Referee: Sam Barrott (West Yorkshire).
Preamble
Chelsea are already in the semi-finals; Arsenal and Crystal Palace aren’t in a position to sort themselves out until next week. Meanwhile tonight we’ll discover the identity of the two other semi-finalists in a staggered style …
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Manchester City v Brentford (7.30pm)
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Newcastle United v Fulham (8.15pm)
… so with this in mind, we’re going quadbox on NFL RedZone segueing into SuperClocko™ mode, incorporating the very first runout for our patented Three-Half MBM System©. Team news when we have it, and advance apologies for the fiasco that will undoubtedly unfold should the game at the Etihad go to penalties while four goals in as many minutes are scored at St James’ Park. Oh, and don’t forget the draw for the semis, which will take place after the end of the third half. It’s on!
