Manchester City came down with the reserve players when they eliminated Brentford in the English League Cup or Carabao Cup quarterfinal match. In the duel between the English Premier League teams at the Etihad Stadium, Thursday, December 18, 2025 early morning WIB, Man City defeated Brentford 2-0 and advanced to the semifinals.
Man City manager Pep Guardiola is no longer making mistakes despite making massive changes to the squad when playing in the Carabao Cup, which is the third tier of the English League.
Previously, Guardiola had deployed a different team by resting 10 of his key players when facing Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League. The result was that Man City lost 2-0 and Guardiola admitted his mistake for playing too many substitutes in a European level match.
However, the former Barcelona coach did not change his belief that second-tier players and youngsters still get the opportunity to play and add hours to the match. So he overhauled the squad by resting seven pillar players when hosting Brentford.
Striker Erling Haaland was also not played in the match. His position was replaced by a young player who is still 18, Divine Mukasa. Likewise, goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma did not appear because James Trafford took over his position.
However, Guardiola finally brought in the main players, Josko Gvardiol, Bernardo Silva and Matheus Nunes. Meanwhile, Phil Foden came in when the match entered the 19th minute to replace Oscar Bobb who was injured.
On the other hand, Brentford also did not appear with the best squad. Manager Keith Andrews kept six players when playing a 1-1 draw against Crystal Palace.
Facing an opponent who lowered the second-tier team, Man City was able to overcome Brentford. Moreover, they played at home.
However, the Cityzens still had to work hard because Brentford had resisted. Even Abdukodir Khusanov had to take down Kevin Schade who had the chance to break into the Trafford goal.
Brentford asked for a red card for Khusanov. However, the referee only gave a yellow card for the offense.
The hosts had to wait until the 32nd minute when midfielder Rayan Cherki broke the deadlock. The goal started when Mukosa took a corner and the ball was thrown into the middle of the arena.
However, the ball was successfully controlled by Cherki who was outside the penalty box. The French player had a chance to control the ball before launching a hard shot that was not saved by goalkeeper Hakon Valdimarsson. When celebrating the goal, he imitated Haaland's yoga style when breaking into the opponent's goal.
The goal gave Man City a 1-0 lead. But after that goal, they struggled to break through the Bees' solid defense. There was no change in the score and Man City was still leading by one goal at halftime.
In the second half, Brentford played better and several times threatened the Man City goal. A good opportunity was obtained by Kristoffer Ajer. However, his kick could be stopped by Trafford. Next, Schade got a chance which was then stopped by Khusanov.
When under pressure, Guardiola then brought in Silva, Gvardiol and Nunes. Their presence on the pitch made Man City's game more lively.
Not long after, Savinho finally brought Man City to increase the lead in the 67th minute. Savinho, who ran to greet Tijjani Reijnders' pass, fired a shot that defeated goalkeeper Valdimarsson.
The score changed 2-0 for Man City and held until the end of the match. This is also Man City's sixth victory in various competitions.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
