Chelsea face off with CSKA Moscow looking to avenge their defeat at Cobham earlier in the competition while Manchester City travel to Turkey to face Fenerbahce, trying to complete a double triumph over the ‘Yellow-Blacks’.
The NextGen series gets into October action tonight with plenty of British interest over the next two days.
Manchester City are first up and after finally gathering their first ever NextGen points, they face they conquered for those inaugural figures once again this evening, as they travel to Turkey to take on Fenerbahce.
While City will be feeling confident after beating their Turkish opposition recently they will no doubt still be wary of a side that for long periods of their previous meeting dominated possession. City won that game as a direct result of excellent performances from Emyr Huws, Jordy Hiwula and Denis Suarez and the ‘Young Citizens’ will hope they can produce again today. As Arsenal’s Young Gunners discovered playing away in Europe can be an extremely difficult proposition, with evidence in their defeat to Olympiakos and that may well prove to be their sternest test ahead of this fixture; that along with containing the highly talented captain Beykan Simsek, who pulled the strings for so much of their last encounter.
A few of the Manchester City boys are obviously looking forward to a taste of hostile European action, or just enjoying the weather…
kieran kennedy @kierank93 Just touched down in turkey! #LoveThisWeather
Coley-Cole @DevanteeeCole On plane to turkey #nextgen
Whilst others were not so keen at the early morning for their flight to Turkey …
Alex Henshall @AlexHenshall11 Getting up early is the worst 🙁 #flying
Manchester City aren’t the only English team flying out for their fixture as Chelsea are playing Moscow in Russia.
Chelsea lost their opening NextGen fixture, despite a star performance from Lucas Piazon, but with him now pushing for the first team and the loss of captain Nathaniel Chalobah on a loan deal to Watford and Thorgan Hazard on a similar deal with Zulte-Waregem their team appears to have got weaker for the return leg. It is a must win for The Blues as CSKA are in top form while, judging by their opening fixture 5-0 thrashing of Molde, Ajax and star-player Viktor Fischer also seem up for the occasion.
Here are some Tweets from the Chelsea boys…
Adam Nditi @Adam_Nditi On the plan to Moscow #next gen #cfc
Fankaty Dabo @big_dabs boarding the plane. Adios england #NextGen
Jordan Houghton @HOUGHTON_J Arrived at the hotel, 5* luxury here! Game day today #NextGen
Chelsea will have to be on top-form to get the ball past CSKA goalkeeper Sengey Revyakin who has been one of the star performers in the competition so far.
In tonight’s other game Wolfsburg take on Barcelona, a game you can catch on British Eurosport with enough time after to watch the Champions League fixtures while Celtic will look to be inspired by their senior sides triumph last night as they welcome PSV Eindhoven to Glasgow.
What do you make of all the NextGen fixtures today?
image: © Free-ers
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