Pep Guardiola might already know Man City line up for Liverpool FA Cup fixture

Two down, two to go. Or is it nine to go?

Manchester City are halfway through the gruelling slate of fixtures that many said would define their season, and things haven't gone badly so far. Over the past week City have defeated Atletico Madrid 1-0 in a Champions League quarter-final first leg and drawn 2-2 with Premier League title rivals Liverpool, a result that maintained City's slender lead at the top of the table.

On Wednesday City will face Atletico in the second leg in Madrid, before flying to London for Saturday's FA Cup semi-final against Liverpool. By Saturday evening, Pep Guardiola's side will have played both sides twice in the space of 11 days — a tough assignment even for a squad of such depth and talent.

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However, failure to beat Liverpool at the weekend means that more important fixtures now await — City's seven remaining Premier League games to be precise. Slip up in any of those and Jurgen Klopp's men could pounce and snatch the title away.

Given the intensity of the games City are involved in at the moment and the important of the fixtures still to come, Guardiola is going to have to rest some of his key men at some point. It's not ideal, but events over the past seven days mean the cup semi-final at Wembley now represents the best opportunity to do so.

City have had barely three days to recover from Liverpool by the time they kick-off in Madrid, but Guardiola cannot afford to ring the changes. Breaking down Atletico's compact defence was hard enough at the Etihad Stadium, the narrow advantage they did secure is not enough to risk disrupting the team's rhythm with wholesale changes.

It took a