Man City travel to Greek fortress

Manchester City travel to Aris Thessaloniki Tuesday to kick off the round of 32 of football's Europa League.

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Berlin – Manchester City travel to Aris Thessaloniki Tuesday to kick off the round of 32 of football's Europa League.

City will have new striker Edin Dzeko on board as the Group A winners seek to end the Greek side's 40-year unbeaten home record in Uefa competition.

Forward Mario Balotelli is unlikely to have recovered from his knee injury while midfielder Nigel De Jong missed Saturday's defeat to Manchester United with an ankle problem and remains a major doubt.

Defender Vincent Kompany urged City to take the Europa League seriously. “This could still be a very good season for Manchester City,” he said after Saturday's defeat.

“There is too much to look forward to for us to start thinking negatively now.”

The rest of the first-leg ties are being played on Thursday, with City's Premier League rivals Liverpool at Sparta Prague.

Liverpool's run of four league wins in a row came to an end on Saturday as an injury-ravaged side could only draw against Wigan Athletic.

Steven Gerrard, Daniel Agger, Joe Cole, Jonjo Shelvey, and Andy Carroll all missed out. Carroll and Shelvey will definitely miss Thursday's game. The others could all return, but forward Luis Suarez is cup-tied.

Napoli look to keep up the impressive form displayed in the Serie A when they come up against Spanish visitors Villareal who are looking for a first success on Italian soil

Uruguayan Edinson Cavani continued his scoring spree Saturday with a brace that sank Roma and brought his tally to 20 goals from 25 games.

Porto's Falcao, who is the competition's top scorer, will be aiming to add to his tally of seven goals in a visit to Sevilla in an all-Iberian duel, while Belgium's Anderlecht take on Dutch side Ajax in a Low Countries derby.

German hopes Bayer Leverkusen are at Ukraine's Metalist Kharkov fresh from a 3-0 win at Eintracht Frankfurt. Veteran midfielder Michael Ballack, who was rested for the game, is thought unlikely to play after a scan revealed a slight injury to the left knee.

Both sides have asked European football's organising body Uefa to bring the game forward to an afternoon kick-off in view of evening temperatures likely to be below 20 degrees Celsius.

VfB Stuttgart travel to Benfica needing to recover from a 4-1home defeat to Nuremberg which has left them in serious relegation danger.

The Portuguese club's city rivals Sporting Lisbon travel to Glasgow to face Rangers, one of eight teams who join from from Champions League.

Four of these are up against each other: Rubin Kazan play Dutch champions FC Twente while fellow Russian side Spartak Moscow travel to Swiss side Basel.

In another Russian-Swiss meeting, Zenit St Petersburg are at Young Boys Berne, while the fourth Russian representative, CSKA Moscow, have a trip to Greek outfit PAOK.

French hopes are carried by Lille, who entertain PSV Eindhoven, and Paris St Germain, who are at BATE Borisov. Elsewhere Poland's Lech Poznan host Portugal's SC Braga, while Turkish side Besiktas entertain Ukraine's Dynamo Kiev.

The return legs will be played between February 22 and 24. – Sapa-dpa

Source: http://www.iol.co.za/man-city-travel-to-greek-fortress-1.1026180

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