True Blue!

Manchester City 2, Manchester United 1

ROBERTO Mancini does not care who Carlos Tevez used to play for — he is just delighted to have the striker at Manchester City.

A Carling Cup winner last season, the first leg of this season’s semi–final with Manchester United could not have gone any better for Tevez.

Two goals — and two gleeful celebrations — have taken City to the brink of their first major final in 29 years and increased his tally to 17 — only months after Sir Alex Ferguson said he was not a prolific scorer.

“I am happy Carlos plays for us because he is a top player,” said Mancini.

“He is an ex–Manchester United player so the game was very important for him. To score two goals was excellent.

It remains to be seen whether the Football Association decides to take further action over his exchange of gestures with United skipper Gary Neville.

It was all rather unedifying, even if it added to the sense of occasion which, once Tevez had nodded home Vincent Kompany’s cross, left Mancini believing his side just have the edge despite falling behind to Ryan Giggs’ early opener.


Fergie remains bullish about return match

SIR Alex Ferguson is optimistic a repeat performance of last night’s Carling Cup effort in the second leg at Old Trafford next week will be enough to send Manchester United to Wembley.

Ferguson found it hard to be too critical of his side following the 2–1 reverse at Manchester City given they dominated for half an hour and continued to create clear openings after Carlos Tevez had ambushed his old club.

And, while they must win to stand any chance of successfully defending their trophy, the United boss remains confident.

“The most important thing will be to play like we did this time,” he said.

“We dominated the match and were reasonably in control. Then we had a mad five minutes before half–time and it brought them back into the game.”