Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola has drafted in several young stars for their Champions League clash against Red Star Belgrade on Wednesday night, including a 20-year-old debutant and former City ballboy.
City are comfortably through to the knockout stages of the tournament, having won all five of their group stage matches in Europe so far.
While they sit top of Group G, with second place RB Leipzig unable to catch them, they’ll play their final game of the pool stages tonight against Red Star Belgrade in Serbia, with their Spanish manager opting to make nine changes from his team that defeated Luton at the weekend.
Guardiola has also notably called on former City ballboy Micah Hamilton, who has impressed for their Premier League 2 side.
A graduate of the City academy, Hamilton has featured in nine PL2 games this season, with the winger having amassed five assists.
He was also once pictured speaking with Guardiola when he was working as a ballboy during a game against Crystal Palace back in 2017.
The manager had reportedly been disappointed by how slowly his side were playing during the match and had called on the ball boy and his colleagues to help his side speed things up.
According to Sam Lee of the Athletic, Guardiola had said: ‘If there was a foul, no-one went to take the ball and start to play. There was five, ten seconds before someone goes to take the ball and start to play. When this happens everything is slow.’
The Spaniard has also recalled out-of-favour midfielder Kalvin Phillips to his side who will start in midfield alongside Hamilton and Matheus Nunes, with Oscar Bobb leading the attack.
More to follow…
