The high-profile exile of Joe Hart from the Manchester City goal is set to end with the England number one being given the chance of redemption in tonight’s Champions League clash.
Czech side Viktoria Plzen travel to the Etihad to take on the Citizens who have managed to secure a place in the last 16 of the competition for the first time in their history.
This gives manager Manuel Pellegrini the luxury of being able to rotate his squad and the Chilean has confirmed Hart will play and has dismissed speculation that the shot-stopper will be leaving Eastlands.
“There is a lot of news about six or seven goalkeepers that we want to buy but it is not true,” he said.
“There is no chance that Joe Hart could go out of this squad in January.”
However, Pellegrini refused to be drawn into deciding who would be in goal for the Premier League game against Swansea at the weekend.
“When we start the next game of the Premier League, we will talk about who will start playing,” added Pellegrini.
“The important thing for Joe is that he will play on Wednesday and we hope he will have a very good performance.”
The Blues are still in contention to win the Group despite losing to Bayern Munich earlier in the competition, and midfielder Samir Nasri says City will fight to the end to try and top the Group.
“We want to win even if we have qualified,” said the Frenchmen.
“We are still going to fight to be top of the group, we know that it is really important for the knockout stages even if we have qualified.”
Pellegrini however believes that the most important thing is to qualify from the Group as opposed to finishing top.
“It is very important thing to win the Group, but it is not the most important thing,” he said.
“The most important thing is to qualify.”
Image courtesy of Manchester City FC via YouTube, with thanks
For more on this story and many others, follow Mancunian Matters on Twitter and Facebook.
