Forest travel to the City of Manchester Stadium on Saturday, in the 3rd round of the FA Cup. The game will be a welcome respite from league affairs for both clubs, who both lie in uncomfortable positions in their respective leagues.
Thanks to financial investments from Abu Dhabi, the Lancashire lads are the wealthiest club in the world of football and demonstrated it in the summer, by paying a transfer record fee of £32.5M for Real Madrid’s Robinho. Forest defender Wes Morgan is sure to make him earn his money in this one.
Despite all their money though, manager Mark Hughes will be under great pressure to get a result and progress to the 4th round. Currently the Blues sit in 13th place in the Prem table, just 2 points above the drop zone. Fans are expectant and will see Forest as nothing more than an intrusion on their way to world football dominance. It would be nice to see an upset and the 3rd round being what it is, anything can happen. That said, you can’t really see anything other than a comfortable Citeh win.
Forest will be in the safe hands of reserve team manager John Pemberton for this one and he will be looking to maintain his 100% record as manager, following his sides 3-2 victory over Norwich last time out. The new manager Billy Davies, will take care of first team afairs from Monday.
Vital Quotes:
Manchester City Team News:
City will be without the services of defender Nedum Onuoha, who damaged his hamstring in the 2-2 draw with Blackburn last time out. Forest fans can also expect to miss out on seeing one or two other star names, as Mark Hughes will probably send out a weakened team.
Player to watch: Shaun Wright-Phillips
The diminutive winger is a Forest reject, deemed too small to make it in the game. Fans will remember him tearing us a new one, when we played Chelsea in the Cup a couple of years ago.
Nottingham Forest Team News:
The Reds’ will be without Brendan Moloney for this one, due to being cup tied. Camp and Martin have had to return to their respective clubs’ due to their loans expiring and there is a concern over Anderson, who picked up a knock in the win over Norwich.
Player to watch: Robert Earnshaw
Little Earn is our top scorer with 7 and will look to add to this, as he makes mince meat of Micah Richards.
Match Facts & Stats
The two sides have a long and illustrious past. In 98 games between them, Forest have won 31, lost 40 and drawn 27. Last time we met was at Maine Road in 2002, where City won 3-0 thanks to a hatrick from former Red, Darren Huckerby. (All stats courtesy of Soccerbase)
Match Prediction:
Citeh Reserves 3-1 Forest
Next Fixtures:
Charlton (a) Jan 10. KO 3pm.
