22 September 2020

Joey Barton unlikely to make many changes for Fleetwood’s cup clash with Everton

22 September 2020

Fleetwood head coach Joey Barton has little room for rotation ahead of the visit of Premier League Everton in the Carabao Cup.

The boyhood Toffees fan is still targeting “four or five” signings before the close of the transfer window but with nothing yet secured he must go with the small squad he has.

That means persisting with the youthful central defensive partnership of teenage academy graduate James Hill and new signing Sam Stubbs, who had never played at League One level prior to joining the club a fortnight ago.

Paddy Madden could return up front, having been left out for Saturday’s defeat at Peterborough.

Everton manager Carlo Ancelotti made 10 changes for the win over League Two Salford in the last round and looks set to repeat that.

Jonjoe Kenny and Niels Nkounkou are set to start again in the full-back positions but the Toffees boss may have to get creative in the centre of defence as he has only two fit senior players for the position in Michael Keane and Yerry Mina and cannot afford another injury in that area.

Second-choice players like Gylfi Sigurdsson, Tom Davies, Alex Iwobi, Anthony Gordon and Moise Kean are all likely to get a start.

Joao Virginia will replace Jordan Pickford in goal for the cup tie once again.

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