Manchester City's Fresh Faces Offer Hope Of Real Madrid Miracle

Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola said his side have just a one percent chance of progress to the Champions League last 16 against Real Madrid on Wednesday but the English champions' new recruits could offer a lifeline. City blew a late 2-1 lead in the first leg of the play-off tie last week at home to lose 3-2 to the holders. That collapse was part of a wider trend this season as Guardiola's ageing squad have struggled to last the pace, particularly when the intensity is turned up on Champions League nights.

As a consequence, City broke with their usual transfer policy to spend big in January, bringing in Omar Marmoush, Abdukodir Khusanov, Vitor Reis and Nico Gonzalez for fees totalling 170 million pounds ($214 million).

However, none of them started the first leg against Madrid. Marmoush was the only one to even make an appearance for the final few minutes off the bench, as Gonzalez and Khusanov were unused substitutes and Reis was not registered in City's European squad.

Guardiola may now regret that decision after Marmoush, Gonzalez and Khusanov all played pivotal roles in arguably City's best performance of the season on Saturday when Newcastle were blown away 4-0 at the Etihad.

Marmoush hogged the headlines thanks to his first-half hat-trick, finally offering City another potent scoring threat to compliment Erling Haaland.

Khusanov recovered from his nightmare Premier League debut against Chelsea last month when he gave away a goal inside three minutes and could have been sent-off shortly afterwards.

This time the Uzbek showed why City paid Lens a reported 40 million euros (33 million pounds, $42 million) for his services.

The 20-year-old's pace helped sniff out the danger posed by Newcastle's Alexander Isak and