Tyrone Marshall, senior football writer for the Manchester Evening News, has explained the formation and personnel changes he expects Pep Guardiola to make for the Carabao Cup quarter-final against Brentford.

Keith Andrews' side travel to Etihad Stadium on Wednesday evening (7.30pm kick-off GMT), live on Sky Sports.

It has been just over two months since the last meeting in the Premier League, which Man City won 1-0. How have things been going since then?

Inconsistent, I would say. City have lost a few games since then and the defeats are coming out of nowhere. They lost to Aston Villa, then lost to Newcastle and, on both occasions, they were on pretty good runs of form beforehand.

They lost to Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League three days after the latter, but they have won five in a row since then, so they are very much all or nothing at the moment. Since the Brentford game, they have either won or they have lost – there have been no draws in there and they have only drawn twice all season.

They have put themselves in a pretty good position in the Premier League title race and it feels like they are having a pretty good season, but I think they are still susceptible to those kinds of defeats that are coming a little bit out of the blue.

City have faced Huddersfield and Swansea so far in the Carabao Cup. What have you made of those games?

It was a very good draw. On both occasions, they made plenty of changes and came through the games pretty easily, really. In the Swansea game, they went behind, but there was never any panic. They were level before half-time and got two goals late on to win it, but it always felt like they were the dominant team.

Both games were pretty comfortable and they strolled through them. They have got a much deeper squad this year, deeper than Pep Guardiola has had at any point in his time at City, so he has been able to make changes for that level of opposition and get through those games pretty comfortably.

Since City won four Carabao Cups in a row between 2017/18 and 2020/21, they have not made it past the quarter-finals. Given the lack of major silverware last season, how seriously will they be taking this competition?

Guardiola has always taken this competition very seriously, certainly when it gets towards the business end. He has always seen it as a prize worth winning.

They are in the quarter-finals again, with a home draw they would expect to win. I think they will want to win it, there is no doubt about that.

There are still some good teams left in the competition so it is not going to be easy to win it, but I think they will want to. That said, I would imagine we are probably still going to see a fair bit of rotation at this stage.

Which player should Brentford be keeping an eye out for on Wednesday night?

It will be interesting to see what Guardiola does with the team selection. After they lost to Newcastle a couple of weeks ago, they played Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League and he made 10 changes, which I do not think anyone saw coming and which is very unusual for Guardiola in a Champions League game.

They played really poorly and lost 2-0, and it was probably the angriest he has been with his players. He scolded himself for making that many changes, but a few days later he was fairly critical of the players for not taking their chance, and I think his phrase was “not trying,” which he meant in terms of showing the ambition to win the game, taking risks and things like that.

He suggested he had learned he cannot make 10 changes again, so I do not know whether we will see 10 in the Carabao Cup or whether it will be a bit less, but I think there are some obvious changes we'll see. The Premier League team has been pretty settled recently, so I think there will be quite a few changes from that.

Omar Marmoush is someone who is definitely going to play, and is probably going to be a bit of a key man. Erling Haaland is having such a good season that Marmoush just cannot really get a look-in.

His last goal was in this competition at Swansea, but that is the only goal he's scored all season. He is just not getting chances because Haaland is doing so well and so rarely comes off.

Marmoush, in a team that is hard to predict, is a guaranteed starter and he is going to be desperate to make the most of it.

What should Keith Andrews’ men expect in terms of shape and style?

I think it will probably be a 4-3-3, but in the league he has been mixing it up and playing in this very narrow formation recently, where there is only one winger playing in Jérémy Doku, but even he is picking up central positions quite a lot.

There have been four midfielders in there; you have got Nico González, Bernardo Silva, Phil Foden and Rayan Cherki, and they have all been playing pretty central, with Cherki drifting a little bit wide or Bernardo wide to the right, Doku, theoretically, on the left, but playing very central.

In the Carabao Cup, because he will make changes, I think it will probably be more of a traditional 4-3-3. I think people like Savinho and Oscar Bobb will play, which will mean wingers, so I think there will be more of that traditional shape.

If Rodri is back, it will probably be a game for him to play, or at least come off the bench, but I think there are going to be question marks as to whether he will be back, in which case González probably plays in midfield.

What’s your score prediction?

I think City, with home advantage, will get through. Had it been away, with a lot of changes, I think they would have found it a lot tougher.

I still do not think it will be easy, and I presume Brentford will go pretty strong, so I think it will be a pretty close game, probably 2-1.