Newcastle United’s biggest win so far this season came back in November when we produced a strong performance to defeat Manchester City 2-1 at St James’ Park.

And the Cityzens are all that stand between us and another trip to Wembley, our third in four years, as we host Pep Guardiola’s side in a Carabao Cup semi-final first leg a week today.

Even though we won the last meeting, recent history is still well and truly on City’s side: the win in the league being the sole win Eddie Howe has managed over Pep Guardiola during his multiple stints as a Premier League manager.

But City are looking at their most vulnerable right now, with injuries mounting up heading into next Tuesday’s clash…

Major blow for Man City

Manchester City have confirmed that defender Josko Gvardiol is set for a long spell on the sidelines after the Croatian suffered a broken shinbone during their 1-1 draw with Chelsea.

This isn’t the only defensive injury Guardiola has to deal with, as it’s emerged today that captain Ruben Dias will be absent for six weeks, ruling him out of both legs of the semi-final after he also limped off on Sunday.

Elsewhere, City’s Rayan Ait Nouri and Omar Marmoush remain at the African Cup of Nations, while Matteo Kovacic, Kalvin Phillips, Oscar Bobb and Savinho could all miss out through injury.

At the back, this means City have only three senior centre back options to choose from between John Stones, Nathan Ake and Abdukodir Khusanov: the first of whom is also suffering from an injury at the moment.

Speaking of Ake, the injury-prone Dutchman captained City the last time we played each other in the Carabao Cup: a 1-0 win for us in the third round courtesy of a goal from Alexander Isak.

The news of their defensive woes will no doubt have inspired City’s reported pursuit for former Toon target Marc Guehi, but even if the England international was to sign this window, he would be cup-tied having already played three games for Crystal Palace in this season’s competition.

Newcastle’s defensive boost

For the first time in weeks, if not months, Eddie Howe has some high-quality squad depth in his defence.

The recent return of Tino Livramento, Sven Botman and Kieran Trippier to the Newcastle squad will finally ease the workload of Lewis Hall, Malick Thiaw, Fabian Schar and Lewis Miley, who were the only fit senior options for much of December.

With equally important games against Liverpool in the Premier League, as well as PSV and PSG in the Champions League, we should expect to see some rotation in the defence over the course of the next few games now we have the aforementioned trio of Livramento, Botman and Trippier back and available.

Livramento was impeccable in the league game against City, so he would be a sensible starter to allow Miley some much-deserved rest. Meanwhile, Botman would once again relish the opportunity to play against Erling Haaland, having contained the Norwegian to just a single goal in seven appearances against us.