Manchester City turn it up to 10 but Burton do themselves proud with gritty resistance

City are in their fourth League Cup final in the past six seasons, beating Burton 10-0 on aggregate. Burton put up proper fight tonight, demonstrating how much they have learned in the past fortnight. City will take on Chelsea or Spurs at Wembley on Feb 24. 

City free-kick 25 yards out, virtually dead centre. Danilo takes and lifts it over the wall. Collins takes a backward step to slap it over the bar as it threatened to dip beneath it. 

Andy Hinchcliffe makes Riyad Mahrez his man of the match. Fair enough. City have hardly been scintillating but Mahrez has carried the main thrust of the attack. 

Last knockings as Burton strive for the goal. They've done themselves and their manager proud tonight. 

Garcia slips on the ice and gives Daniel a sniff but once again the young centre-back recovers in the nick of time. He doesn't panic. 

Mendy and Poveda open up Burton down the left, the left-back overlapping like a man who has missed all this, but again Harness sprints back to help Akins and the pair of them snuff out the threat. Burton have given it all in their energetic pressing of City this half. 

Harness appeals to the linesman for a penalty as he races on to a pass threaded by Fox down the inside-right channel. In truth the pass was overhit and allowed Muric to get there first, reaching the ball before providing a barrier that Harness could not avoid hitting, like a sleeping policeman. 

Have just seen a replay of a strong challenge by Harness on Nmecha in the Burton box - it was a shoulder-to-shoulder collision and Harness went on to win the ball and turn upfield. All 'perfectly legit', as Dominic Littlewood, or at least Andy Dawson's version of him, would say. 

Burton substitution - Daniel comes on up front for Boyce. 

Delph escapes a booking despite his fouls totting up. He takes a lecture instead and smiles as he retreats. 

Chance for Burton. Its -2C at pitchside and the players are losing their footing. Here it's Sandler who slips about 20 yards from goal under pressure from Boyce and the striker nicks it away and into the box. Out flies Muric who makes a brave headlong dive to close him down and block. The ball squirms back to the penalty spot and Miller hits it first time, sending a low shot towards goal. Two City players had retreated to the line with Muric stranded and Garcia, brilliantly positioned, belts it clear. 

Mahrez drops into the No10 position and slips a diagonal pass to the right to the space he had just vacated. Danilo, flooding into the gap, tries to pass to the far post for Jesus but gets his angle and pace wrong and pings it behind. 

Final City substitution: Felix Nmecha comes on for Zinchenko. Within 30 seconds of his introduction he skedaddles down the left and fizzes a daisycutter through the area that McFadzean hacks clear. 

Akins and Harness combine down the right and the latter takes it on to the corner of the box before slipping a pass around the corner for Miller but Garcia read it and nicked it away before he could do anything with it. 

Double City substitution: Benjamin Mendy and Gabriel Jesus replace Kevin De Bruyne and Kin Aguero. 

Aguero misses a sitter from 10 yards, steering a right foot shot wide of the right post with an unimpeded path to goal. Slick approach play from young Poveda and some quick inter-passing from De Bruyne and Foden down the left had set him up perfectly. 

Strong header from Danilo, standing in front of Muric, clears a menacing flat diagonal cross from Harness. Miller wins the clearance and move sit out to Templeton on the left and he diddles Danilo with a drop of the shoulder but then his control lets him down just as he was setting up a chance to shoot from the left of the area. He stabbed his attempt to cushion it at Sandler who cleared. 

Delph tries to ghost on to a ball down the right of the Burton box but he is repelled by strong defending and his own airkick. The ball comes back to him off the keeper but he shanks his next shot behind. Up the other end from the goalkick Templeton runs straight into Danilo and goes down in the box. He politely inquires about a penalty but neither the ref nor the VAR men in the van give him any succour. 

City now popping the ball about midfield until Templeton picks off a pass and moves forward, playing it up to Hutchinson who slips, recovers but loses momentum. 

It's getting very slippy out there and Garcia hits the deck, losing the ball and allowing Boyce a run at goal but he recovers well and retrieves it. Oozing class. 

Burton are going for the goal that Nigel Clough asked for, moving the ball forward far more frequently and committing more men forward. Boyce and Akins are pressing hard and have a couple of moments of possession 20 yards out before Sandler and Garcia step up. 

Burton are out of the traps like lightning and Templeton bombs down the right to receive a diagonal pass then flashes a shot wide. 

Ben Fox replaces Stephen Quinn for Burton. 

A cocktail of class and toil from City and respectable endeavour from Burton who have had a couple of moments when they opened up the visitors' defence. Given they lost the first half at the Etihad 4-0 nd the second 5-0, to go in 1-0 down to a team with 117 times the income, never mind the resources, is a triumph of sorts. 

Delph makes a run through the middle when Mahrez has it 10 yards inside the Albion half. Mahrez looks up and arcs a pass over the D that is overclubbed and as Delph stretches for it with a back flick, Akins steps in from right back to prod it away. 

Mazy, crazy dribble from Harness when he wasn't entirely in control of the ball makes progress down the inside-right channel and feeds the galloping McFadzean. But he misplaces the pass, City break and McRory has to clean up. He starts the counter with a ball up the left and Templeton whips over a cross that Zinchenko clears unconvincingly. 

Ben Turner has to go off injured. Seems to have hurt his left ankle as he limps off. Reece Hutchinson replaces him and he will go to left-back consigning the former Portsmouth wing-back, Damien McRory to fill in at centre-half. 

Couple of half chances, the first for City when De Bruyne's brilliant chip picks out Garcia deep in the box by the left post and all he had to do was square it to Aguero but he miscontrolled it into touch. Then Burton draw City's defence out and Quinn plays the perfect angled pass between Danilo and Sandler for Boyce to run on to from halfway. But Muruc sniffs the danger and races 25 yards to beat the Burton forward to it. 

Bad tackle by Foden  on David Templeton. He went straight through him, taking him down with his left foot and making sure with his right. Free kick but no card. Boyce gives Muric the hurry-up but the keeper gets there soundly enough. 

Poveda shows his rich promise with a penetrating run down the inside left channel, dribbling at full pelt past Quinn to open a route for Zinchenko round the back but the left-back was flagged, doubtfully, offside. 

Burton respond well, stringing together about 25 passes and penultimately freeing McRory down the left and he goes to the byline. He lifts his head and rolls the ball back to Will Miller, 25 yards out on the left of the D. He opens his body and tries to bend a shot in at the far post but can't get it to dip or curl enough and it soars into the crowd. 

Like the proverbial hot knife through butter De Bruyne sweeps a lovely diagonal pass from the centre-circle, sending it 30-yards and on a plate for Mahrez sprinting down the left wing, halfway between the box and the touchline. He cushions the ball, takes a stride into the area and lays it off perfectly to Aguero who buries it with a precise and measured shot into the bottom right corner. 

Burton 0-1 Man City (Aguero)

Mahrez is given the benefit of the doubt by the referee when he wins the ball off Templeton near the centre-circle. Looked like a foul. 

Aguero isn't sparkling tonight. In the last couple of minutes he has miskicked entirely and gouged a massive divot out of the pitch and tried to trap a flighted ball into the box but instead toe-ended it behind for a goalkick. 

Mahrez collects De Bruyne's 30-yard pass by the angle of the box, 18 yards out, cuts inside towards the D then whistles a left-foot shot wide of the left post. He expected it to curl back in more than it did. 

Clever movement in the area from Burton drags the inexperienced City defence around the box and allows Boyce to meet the whipped, right-foot cross with a half-volley flick that steers his shot too close to Muric. 

Burton free-kick on the right, parallel with the 18-yard line, given to them by Delph's rash foul. He had made a gift of the ball to Boyce and mugged him when he took it on and threatened to make him pay for the error. 

Sandler's turn to Beckenbauer it out from the back and he sweeps a pass up the right for Mahrez. He plays it back to Danilo who feeds it inside for Delph. The central midfielder lofts a left-foot pass diagonally 40 yards to Mahrez who is beyond the far post. He controls it, ignores Aguero's shout and lashes a shot just wide of the near post. 

Eric Garcia brings it out of defence, makes 20 yards and pushes it forward into space up the left for Poveda and Aguero. It's the captain, Aguero, who takes it up and shifts the ball inside to De Bruyne who works it across to the right, gets it back then gives it to Mahrez who angles a pass from the centre down the inside-left channel for Aguero. He takes a touch then scuffs a shot across goal. 

Templeton cuts in off the left won on to his right foot and cracks a shot from 25 yards into Sandler's shin and it bounces clear. 

Foden is playing on the right of the midfield three, Delph on the left and De Bruyne in the middle. They are very comfortable in possession and are trying to create space with movement and angled passes. 

Turner, closed down rapidly by Mahrez and Aguero, wellies the ball into touch with his left foot. 

City fans are singing their take on Allez Allez Allez, you know the one that ends "Sterling won the double, the Scousers won eff all." And the team begin by zipping the ball around the back. Burton are playing a compact 4-5-1. 

They're shaking hands and we are about to start. 

"When we look back at it with the children, we should be proud that we’ve been on the same pitch as some of these players."

 Nigel Clough wants 'pride' and 'a goal if we can get one'. 

The England Under-18 winger started in Arsenal's youth system, left for Barcelona where he spent two years at La Masia before joining  City in 2016 via Brentford.

Burton Albion Collins, McFadzean, Turner, Akins, Templeton, McCrory, Harness, Miller, Wallace, Quinn, Boyce.
Substitutes Bywater, Brayford, Buxton, Sbarra, Fox, Hutchinson, Daniel.

Manchester City Muric, Zinchenko, Sandler, Garcia, Danilo, Delph, Foden, De Bruyne, Poveda, Mahrez, Aguero.
Substitutes Grimshaw, Stones, Mendy, Jesus, F Nmecha, Bolton, Richards.

Referee Kevin Friend (Leicester)

Welcome to coverage of Barnstoneworth United versus Manchester City, the second leg of a League Cup semi-final that begins with the home side trailing by nine goals. It could have been worse - as Bury, in 1983 when defeated by West Ham 10-0 in this competition or Fulham three years later when they lost 10-0 at Anfield, could attest. But for a semi-final it was a marmalising of historic proportions.  

What more can Burton do, in the words of Michael Palin and Terry Jones, but show the value of what’s inside their shorts: “The machine you've got pounding away in there, up and down, up and down for 90 minutes. You can wear all the bloody shorts you want. You can wear 15 woolly pairs on top of one another, it won't make a hap'orth of difference unless that punching, pounding pulsating machine can't keep running, and tackling and fighting.”

It probably won’t make a blind bit of difference to a City side that can call on Fabian Delph, Benjamin Mendy, Kevin De Bruyne, Riyad Mahrez, Gabriel Jesus and Sergio Agüero as well as a handful of golden academy prospects but it will give them heart for the rest of the season as well as the £500,000 Albion have earned by knocking out the club has earned by knocking out Shrewsbury Town, Aston Villa, Burnley, Nottingham Forest and Middlesbrough. What happened at the Etihad can’t take that away from them.

As for City who might have one eye on Norris McWhirter, they need to win by two goals to join the ranks of the biggest aggregate victories in League Cup history: Liverpool 11 Exeter 0, 1981-82; West Ham 12 Bury 1, 1983-84; Liverpool 13 Fulham 2, 1986-87; Watford 11 Darlington 0, 1987-88 and Everton 11 Wrexham 0, 1990-91. With the squad they’ve named, you’d think it a cinch May the road rise up to meet you, Burton.