Here’s Daniel Taylor’s match report from the Etihad Stadium. That’s all from me tonight. Thanks for reading and emailing. Bye.
Just the 16 goals for Manchester City in the last four days. Poor Rotherham. Poor Burton Albion. The second leg on 23 January will be a sight to behold.
Burton tried so hard after going 9-0 down. And they kept it to single figures with a backs-to-the-wall effort. A victory of sorts, I suppose.
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Full-time: Manchester City 9-0 Burton Albion
Embarrassment for City as they fail to hit 10 against the League One side.
90 min+1: David Silva has a shot blocked.
90 min: There will be two added minutes. Burton have everyone back. They really don’t want to concede again.
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87 min: Zinchenko’s header, Otamendi’s header, Collins’s save. It isn’t 10 yet.
86 min: Very good, John.
Subs: Immel, Wiekens, Frontczek, McNab, P Gallagher, Santa Cruz, Foden. https://t.co/NJzhf7i0xQ
— John Brewin (@JohnBrewin_) January 9, 2019
85 min: The crowd are urging City to hit double figures. Magic of the cup.
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Phil Foden sends Bernardo Silva away down the left. Bernardo’s cross finds Mahrez, who scuffs his first shot before adjusting well to scoop the ball low to the right of Collins with his left foot. Burton have never faced anything remotely resembling this before.
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GOAL! Manchester City 9-0 Burton Albion (Mahrez, 83 min)
This is absolutely ridiculous.
81 min: Jesus runs on to a long pass over the top, waits for support and plays the ball back to Mahrez, who sees his shot deflected over by a brilliant block from Buxton.
79 min: Joe Sbarra replaces Scott Fraser.
78 min: Maybe not. Silva’s deflected shot hits the post and out goes for a corner.
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77 min: City are playing keep ball. They might be letting Burton off now.
74 min: Danilo replace Kyle Walker. Burton are in big trouble now.
73 min: Fair play to City, though, they’ve matched West Ham’s 8-0 win over Macclesfield earlier in the tournament.
72 min: Maybe ... maybe ... maybe it would have been different if Harness had made it 1-1 in the first half.
Riyad Mahrez crosses first time from the left and Kyle Walker clips a cushioned shot home from 12 yards. Good finish.
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GOAL! Manchester City 8-0 Burton Albion (Walker, 70 min)
Well done.
68 min: Ben Fox replaces Jamie Allen. David Templeton replaces Liam Boyce.
67 min: Bernardo Silva replaces Leroy Sane.
A raking pass finds Sane on the left. He takes it on his chest before flicking a ball through Brayford’s legs with the outside of his boot, teeing up Jesus to turn past Collins from close range. This isn’t a fair fight.
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GOAL! Manchester City 7-0 Burton Albion (Jesus, 65 min)
Can’t they blow up now?
64 min: Sane skitters down the left and pulls the ball back to Silva, who astonishes everyone by scooping over from close range. He looks disgusted with himself.
Another pass from Gundogan releases Jesus. The Brazilian slams his shot straight at Collins but the rebound runs to Foden, who sets himself before drilling past the man on the line for his second goal in two games.
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GOAL! Manchester City 6-0 Burton Albion (Foden, 62 min)
He’s only been on the pitch four minutes!
58 min: Phil Foden replaces Kevin de Bruyne.
After a quiet start to the second half, David Silva slips a pass through to Riyad Mahrez on the right. From the byline, the Algerian dinks a cross into the middle and Jesus heads his third past Collins.
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GOAL! Manchester City 5-0 Burton Albion (Jesus, 57 min)
The Brazilian completes his hat-trick!
54 min: “Can we discuss the Burton Albion badge for a moment,” says Ryan Foley. “Perhaps the most stupidly awesome badge in the top four divisions. The depicted footballer looks like a Sunday league player based on the prodigious belly. He also appears to be wearing boots. Like not football cleats/boots—actual boots. Wellingtons, perhaps.”
52 min: Akins’s cutback is swept over by Fraser from the edge of the area.
48 min: Foden please!
46 min: Manchester City get the second half underway. Sane gets in down the left straight away but his control lets him down.
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Half-time: Manchester City 4-0 Burton Albion
It’s been one of the great cup semi-finals.
45 min: No penalty. The Burton fans cheer ironically.
44 min: Gabriel Jesus goes down with a knock on his ankle. Turner caught him just inside the area. “VAR! VAR!” chant the crowd. They’re having a look.
42 min: De Bruyne sends Sane clear on the left. The German’s low ball makes it to Mahrez after an error from Hutchinson, but Collins brilliantly turns the winger’s sharp volley over.
40 min: City should have to even this up playing with Roger Johnson in central defence in the second half.
Even their crosses are going in now. Leroy Sane plays a pass back to Zinchenko, who looks to deliver from the left. He overhits it but it catches out Collins, who can’t stop the left-back’s cross from sailing over his head and into the top-left corner. Zinchenko has the good grace to look embarrassed. No doubt he’d have preferred to score his first goal for City in different circumstances.
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GOAL! Manchester City 4-0 Burton Albion (Zinchenko, 37 min)
This isn’t fair.
GOAL AWARDED!
Mike Dean waits a moment and then gets word that David Silva was just onside when Ilkay Gundogan picked him out. Replays show it was the right call. As for what happened with the goal itself, Silva was able to cushion the ball across to Jesus, all alone in the middle of the area, and the Brazilian took a touch before slamming a shot home off the inside of the left post.
Photograph: Phil Noble/Reuters
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VAR check!
David Silva might have been offside.
GOAL! Manchester City 3-0 Burton Albion (Jesus, 34 min)
This is getting ugly.
Another easy goal. Ilkay Gundogan carves Burton open with a lovely pass through to Leroy Sane, who’s popped up on the right. Sane’s takes the ball on his chest, with Akins dozing, and advances on goal. Collins does well to save but the rebound loops into the six-yard box and Gabriel Jesus heads into the empty net.
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GOAL! Manchester 2-0 Burton Albion (Jesus, 30 min)
The crowd goes wild.
27 min: I’m not surprised there’s a low crowd at the Etihad this one. It might be a semi-final but Burton are a League One side. That said, it’s creating a weird, low-key atmosphere and it seems to have led to a lack of intensity on the pitch.
25 min: A speedy City counterattack ends with Jesus cutting inside and skimming a shot wide from the left.
22 min: Silva drives a low ball across the face of goal. Hutchinson hacks clear. Then De Bruyne lifts another pass over the top to Sane, who’s astonished no one in blue is there to attack his cross into the six-yard box. Gabriel Jesus could do with pulling his finger out.
20 min: Allen whacks a shot well over from 25 yards.
18 min: Mahrez runs on to a lofted pass from Gundogan and pops the ball into the net. Flag’s up, though. No need for VAR. Mahrez knew he was off.
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16 min: Burton are causing a few problems, you know. They get the ball into the area and Boyce uses his physicality to win a corner. Nothing comes from it, though.
15 min: Sane’s delivery from the left hasn’t been right yet. But he’s found so much space in these opening stages, he’s bound to sort it out eventually.
12 min: Burton creep forward - and contrive a dreadful miss! Akins, who’s showing no fear on the ball, takes City on down the left and fizzes a low cross into the middle. The ball skids all the way to the far post, where Zinchenko’s been pulled out of position and runs all the way to Harness. Eight yards out and totally unmarked, he should equalise; instead he sticks his effort into the upper tier. Oh dear. They aren’t going to get many of those.
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10 min: De Bruyne, who appears to be in the zone, snipes a pass through to Sane. It’s just overhit, though. Collins races from his line to smother the danger. But you know it won’t be long before another City attack. In fact, as I was saying: Mahrez slips Walker in on the right, but his cutback’s hacked away.
8 min: Gundogan’s dangerous cross is headed away.
7 min: City win a free-kick deep on the left. Another chance.
Burton had just survived a scramble in their own area but this goal has been coming. City immediately construct another attack and Silva’s given too much space to lift his head and whip a cross into the middle from the left. De Bruyne, breaking from midfield, is unmarked to steer a low header past Collins. So simple. Nigel Clough sits slumped in his chair. It’s the look of a man who thinks it could be a long evening.
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GOAL! Manchester City 1-0 Burton Albion (De Bruyne, 5 min)
It didn’t take long.
3 min: Sane’s cross from the left is headed away as far as Zinchenko, who fires wide from 20 yards.
2 min: Moments later, De Bruyne lifts a pass over the top for Mahrez. The Algerian’s onside but he takes his eye off the ball and miscontrols. He would have been clear on goal.
Peep! Burton, all in yellow, get the game underway and they have a shot within the first 10 seconds! Here we go, eh? It’s Akins who has it, letting fly from 20 yards, but it’s an easy save for Muric. What a start from the underdogs, though!
Here come the teams. Manchester City and Burton Albion. In a different era this could have been something from the old Division Two. Not these days, mind you. Things have changed in these parts.
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Just a reminder: VAR will be in use tonight. Here’s hoping for more technology fun and games.
Nigel Clough speaks! “It’s always difficult but the team picks itself in some ways. Losing Stephen Quinn is a big blow. We have to dream but we just try to play our normal team. I want us to go and play a little bit if we can. We don’t want to give the ball away in silly areas but I want the players to be confident.”
Pep Guardiola speaks! “Almost everybody is fit except Sergio and Vincent. Kevin de Bruyne and David Silva need minutes. They need rhythm. When you are four or five months injured, you need minutes for the pace.”
I did some news! Like a real proper journalist!
Pre-match reading
Team news
Manchester City: Muric; Walker, Otamendi, Garcia, Zinchenko; Gundogan; Mahrez, Silva De Bruyne, Sane; Jesus. Subs: Ederson, Danilo, Stones, Sterling, Delph, Bernardo, Foden.
Burton Albion: Collins; Brayford, Buxton, Turner, Hutchinson; Wallace, Allen, Fraser, Harness; Boyce, Akins. Subs: Bywater, McFadzean, Sbarra, Templeton, Fox, McCrory, Miller.
Referee: Sir Mike Dean.
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Preamble
Hello. Not to sound too pessimistic about Burton Albion’s chances here, but it’s difficult to look past Manchester City warming up for this League Cup semi-final by walloping Rotherham 7-0. Seems there’s no such thing as a day off in Pep Guardiola’s world. City’s manager could, of course, have shown that he is bigger fish to fry than the quaint old FA Cup by starting himself and Mikel Arteta in midfield against Rotherham. Instead he picked a side full of stars, three days after City’s draining win over Liverpool in the Premier League, and watched as they showed absolutely no mercy against their Championship opponents.
“I’m pleased the final whistle came,” said Paul Warne, Rotherham’s shellshocked manager – and Nigel Clough can only hope he isn’t feeling the same way in few hours. Poor Burton. You wait your entire existence to reach the last four of a major cup competition and then you get drawn against this lot. Burton are ninth in League One and, being brutally honest, they probably don’t stand much of a chance of making it to Wembley for next month’s final. Whereas Clough’s side are ninth in League One, City’s current second string involves Kevin de Bruyne, Ilkay Gundogan, Gabriel Jesus and Riyad Mahrez. Conclusion: the odds are ever so slightly stacked against the underdogs.
But hey, it’s not every day you get to play in a cup semi-final. Burton have made it this far after beating Aston Villa, Burnley, Middlesbrough and Nottingham Forest, and they’ll be determined to give their 5,000 travelling fans something to remember this evening; if Clough’s players can’t enjoy the experience of taking on arguably the best team in the world, they should probably give up now. But with a quadruple to chase, City will be determined to establish a healthy lead before the second leg. No point messing around, after all. Guardiola might even tell the groundsmen to cut the grass at the Etihad Stadium for this one.
Kick-off: 7.45pm GMT.
