Man City v F.C. København UEFA Cup match preview

By: j | February 17th, 2009

Mark Hughes Manchester City travel to Denmark to face F.C. København in UEFA Cup action on Wednesday. Following Saturday’s demoralizing 2-0 loss to Portsmouth, the Citizens are anxious to advance in the UEFA Cup and know and good performance in København is key.

Prior to the match, the manager said:

“And if you look at the game at the weekend, we possibly lacked that ability to drive past people with pace with the ball and get in behind people.

Referring to the absence of Shaun Wright-Phillips, who was suspended in the match, he said:

“We struggled, but Shaun will help in that respect – he takes people on in good areas and things happen when you do that.

“In recent away games – Stoke and Portsmouth spring to mind – teams have set up to make sure they get a draw then anything else is a bonus. Teams have sat back and we haven’t been able to break them down and make the chances.

“Then we’ve been caught out by sucker punches. We’ve got to create more chances. We are playing too much like the home side away from home, if that makes sense. We’ve had the majority of possession but without real threat or attacking focus.

“It only takes one slip or a couple of consecutive errors and we concede. Trying to get back on terms then is a difficult task. Chasing games away from home is always more difficult.”

The Citizens will have a near full squad available with only Gelsen Fernandes out after Robinho passed a fitness test. Richard Dunne and Shaun Wright-Phillips, under suspension in domestic competition will return but unfortunately new addition Nigel de Jong was not included in the UEFA Cup squad list. Sitting second in the Danish Superliga Ståle Solbakken’s København are without former Grêmio striker César Santín but will debut Dame N’Doye, Johan Wiland and Martin Vingaard to their lineup.

Enjoy the match and as always, I will report on it as it concludes.