Manchester City will look to keep alive their hopes of European silverware this season when they take on current Europa League holders Porto on Thursday.
City have seen their challenge for numerous trophies this season come up short so far, with exits from the Carling Cup and the F.A Cup in recent weeks coming after their maiden Champions League campaign ended with disappointment in the group stage.
Now boss Roberto Mancini and his expensively assembled side will have look to add the F.A Cup they won last year as they go about becoming a major force in European football, but first they must overcome a Porto side looking to defend their title having also dropped down from Champions League.
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The Premier League leaders go into the game after a heartening 1-0 win over Aston Villa on Sunday which helped them reclaim the top spot which had been temporarily taken from them by Manchester United, but with their away form proving to be less than spectacular in recent weeks Porto will be quietly confident of securing an advantage going into the second leg.
With the Africa Cup of Nations now finished, Yaya Toure and Kolo Toure have returned from Equatorial Guinea and Gabon having tasted defeat in the final against Zambia to hook up with their Manchester City team-mates.
Mancini described Yaya as ‘irreplaceable’ when he left for the tournament last month and the Italian is likely to field the former Barcelona midfielder despite admitting he is ‘tired’ after his exertions for his country.
Having lost manager Andre Villas-Boas to Chelsea and leading striker Radamel Falcao to Atletico Madrid over the summer, Vitor Pereira’s side have struggled to step out of the shadow of the treble winning team of last season but only suffered their first league defeat of the season two weeks ago and remain hot on the heels of current league leaders Benfica.
Porto prepared for the highly anticipated clash with a comfortable 3-0 win over the Primeira Division’s bottom-club Uniao de Leiria, with suspended duo Nicolas Otamendi and Rolando, who missed the game, returning for the tie against City.