Pep Guardiola, the Manchester City manager, has a tough decision to make. He'll have to choose which of the new players he signed in January to keep out of the Champions League knockout stages by Thursday's deadline.

City's been on a bit of a losing streak recently, and they spent €210 million ($219m) last month on Omar Marmoush, Nico González, Abdukodir Khusanov and Vitor Reis.

Clubs have to tell UEFA about their 25-man squad for the knockout stages by 11 p.m. GMT on Thursday, but each club can only make three changes from their league phase squad.So City have to leave at least one of their four new signings out.

They'll be playing Real Madrid in the playoff stage, with the first leg at the Etihad on 11 February and the second at the Bernabéu on 19 February.

This will be the fourth time in a row that City and Madrid have met in the Champions League knockout stages.Last season, they drew both legs before the Spanish giants eventually progressed after winning penalties and went on to lift the title against Borussia Dortmund. The year before that, City won 5-1 on aggregate in the semi-finals before beating Inter Milan in the final to complete a historic treble.