Manchester City v Newcastle United: Milner wants holders´ eyes on the prize

James Milner insists Manchester City are fully focused on the next stage of their League Cup defence against Newcastle United on Wednesday.

City overcame Newcastle on their own patch in the fourth round of last season’s competition and the sides meet with a quarter-final spot once again up for grabs at the Etihad Stadium.

Following their Wembley triumph over Newcastle’s north-east rivals Sunderland to lift the trophy in March, City returned to the competition in style with a resounding 7-0 win against Sheffield Wednesday in round three but Manuel Pellegrini’s team head into their latest match on the back of a deeply disappointing week.

Milner scored to give the City a 2-0 lead against CSKA Moscow in the UEFA Champions League last Wednesday, only for their Russian hosts to salvage a 2-2 draw, and West Ham saw off a late rally to defeat the reigning Premier League champions at the weekend.

Although the latter two competitions arguably represent higher priorities for the club, former Newcastle midfielder Milner believes City must fight hard on all fronts to ensure they are firmly in the hunt for trophies at the business end of the season.

“We just take it one game at a time, concentrate on whatever is in front of us and try and win it,” he told the club’s official website.

“You can play three different competitions in a week so you can’t spend too much time thinking about just one

“We are the League Cup holders and although some say some cups are more important than others, a lot of people have never won the League Cup and would love to have the chance.

“I think everyone can see how seriously we take it by the teams we’ve put out in the past few years and nothing will change this year.”

By contrast, Newcastle enter the match in high spirits after beating Tottenham 2-1 on Sunday to secure back-to-back wins and climb out of the Premier League relegation zone.

Alan Pardew’s side recovered a 1-0 deficit as Sammy Ameobi made an instant impact after being introduced at half-time before fellow substitute Remy Cabella supplied the cross for Ayoze Perez to mark his first start with a goal.

All three men could feature from kick-off in what is expected to be a reshuffled Newcastle line-up, while Ryan Taylor may be set for a first domestic start since March 2012 after appearing on the White Hart Lane bench on Sunday.

Pellegrini is also likely to use the occasion to give some of his fringe players an outing. Joe Hart’s understudy Willy Caballero is favourite to start in goal, while highly rated forward Jose Angel Pozo will hope to be involved once more having scored on his debut in the previous round.

Frank Lampard notched a brace against Wednesday but the former England midfielder remains sidelined with a thigh problem.