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Champions League: Graeme Souness previews Sporting v Chelsea and Man City v Roma

Sky Sports pundit puzzled by Manuel Pellegrini's handling of Joe Hart

Image: Hart: Souness puzzled by decision to leave him out against Hull

The Champions League returns on Tuesday night and our live coverage on Sky Sports 5 sees Chelsea travel to Sporting Lisbon, while Manchester City face Roma. Sky Sports pundit Graeme Souness says both English sides should win, but he’s mystified by the handling of Joe Hart…

Manchester City v Roma

I felt Manchester City played well away at Bayern Munich in their opening Champions League match.

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Joe Hart says he wants to play every game for Manchester City

You expect to go there and spend a lot of time without the ball and they withstood that for 89 minutes before conceding the only goal of the game. They could be encouraged, although ultimately disappointed, with their performance for the first 89 minutes.

Joe Hart made a couple of good saves that night and I was mystified as to why he was left out for the game against Hull at the weekend. He played well at Bayern and well against Chelsea the previous weekend so I don’t get that one.

Unless he’s carrying a knock that we don’t know about, it’s an odd one because he has made a fabulous start to the season. We are still in September, so why would you be resting people? Especially a goalkeeper? No, I don’t get that.

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I was quite critical of Joe last year and I thought he deserved to be left out of the team for a while – but I did qualify that by saying he would come back stronger and better – and he has done.

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Football mirrors life. You take knocks and a lot depends on how you react to them. He reacted in a very positive way last season and returned even better, so I would certainly expect him to play in the European game.

On Tuesday night they play Roma, who are one of the stand-out teams in Italian football today along with Juventus. However, they are a stand-out side in what is an ordinary league and I’m not quite sure what we will get from them.

I feel Manchester City, because of the quality of their players, will win the game. There is always pressure to win your home games in the Champions League, but I feel they will be capable.

Manuel Pellegrini knows the quality he has in his squad and he knew that even if they got nothing from the first game in Munich it wouldn’t be a disaster.

They came close to getting a result in Munich and can take encouragement from that. Now they must win their home game against Roma.

Sporting Lisbon v Chelsea, 7pm, Tuesday, Sky Sports 5

Image: Costa: Schalke draw means he has to start in Lisbon

Chelsea have been fabulous this season – apart from that draw with Schalke in their opening Champions League game.

I thought they would roll the German team over at Stamford Bridge because Schalke had not been going well at that time, so for the game to end 1-1 was a real surprise to me.

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Because of that result, the last thing Jose Mourinho can afford to do is go to Lisbon and lose to Sporting. However, I don’t think that will happen.

The main question mark he has is how much time on the pitch to give to Diego Costa. The Chelsea manager is looking at the big picture, which is that Costa is so far ahead of the other strikers at the club that he needs to protect him.

If Costa had been at Chelsea last season they would have won the league and Mourinho will see it that way. Because of that – and because of his fitness concerns - he will know that he needs to protect him.

Unfortunately, the ordinary result against Schalke means that he needs to risk him in Lisbon. If they’d got three points in the bag then they could have gone to Lisbon, left the main striker on the bench and made sure they got a draw.

As long as you win your home games and draw your away games, then you should make it out of your group but that first result has put a different complexion on things.

However, with Costa in the team I can see Chelsea going there and digging a result out. They should have too much of everything and are playing with their tails up at the moment.

Sporting Lisbon v Chelsea is live on Sky Sports 5 from 7pm, Tuesday with Roberto Di Matteo, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Glenn Hoddle joining Jeff Stelling in the studio.

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