Jamie Redknapp says Roberto Mancini risks losing face if Mario Balotelli is in Man City's squad to face Chelsea.
Balotelli is trying to be a superstar without the hard work, says Jamie
The shockwaves from Manchester City's painful Europa League exit will reverberate around the club's boardroom for quite some time.
That defeat will hurt all the more because City gave themselves every chance of overturning Dynamo Kiev's first-leg lead but were undone by Mario Balotelli's recklessness.
Quite simply, he looked like a player who wanted to get sent off. Going in so hard and high on another player - regardless of the importance of the game - is nothing short of ludicrous.
It doesn't have a place in any team and causes any number of problems on and off the pitch. I don't know the boy but I'm sure his team-mates are looking at his attitude and body language right now and wondering if he really wants to be there.
Appalled
It's not the first time Balotelli has had me scratching my head; I was appalled at the dig he had at Jack Wilshere after being named Young Player of the Year, saying he didn't know who Jack was. I know who I'd rather have in my team and it's Jack any day of the week.
Balotelli has got genuine ability and I'd like to be able to excuse his actions on the grounds of his age but that time has long since gone. He's stepped out of line too many times now and he has to start addressing his problems.
It looks as if he's trying to be a superstar without putting in the hard work, as though he thinks he is better than he is.
It wouldn't surprise me one bit if Balotelli, as Mancini has warned, isn't in the squad for Sunday's trip to Chelsea. He must have lost face with his team-mates who will now be looking for Mancini to set a precedent by saying 'this guy cost us big'.
Mancini isn't the type of man to cut his nose off to spite his face - he knows Balotelli is a potential match-winner against Chelsea - but he's also invested a lot of patience in his striker and it hasn't been rewarded.
My other worry for City is that Mancini is one of only a handful of managers who can probably deal with Balotelli. If Mancini does go in the summer, Balotelli is going to become a really expensive misfit because I can't see that many other managers would suffer him.
Hindsight
More and more people seem to be questioning whether Mancini was right to let so many players go out on loan in January.
Given the injuries he has had to deal with - James Milner, Adam Johnson and Shay Given to name but three - it wouldn't surprise me if he does rue the absence of Roque Santa Cruz or Wayne Bridge towards the end of the season.
But that's all hindsight and as a manager Mancini made those decisions at that time with the best interests of his side.
If he looked at Emmanuel Adebayor, for example, and saw someone who wasn't pulling his weight or who had a negative impact on the dressing room, he had to make the right call in the interests of his squad.
On the flip-side, it's hard to see how any of those can have more of an ill-effect on the team than what Balotelli did!
Pivotal
Putting all that aside, I'm really looking forward to Sunday's game. A few weeks ago I thought Chelsea were well out of the title race but they've managed to get themselves back into it without playing their best - and victory over City will take them back up to third. If they do go to United in May and win, then you never know.
For their part, City have always aimed to finish at least fourth this season - and they still have a really good opportunity of doing that. Plus they've an FA Cup semi-final still to come against a United side picking up a few injuries at the wrong time - all is far from lost.
The rearranged Tottenham game looks like it could be a huge one again for them, just as it was last May when Spurs got that 1-0 win away from home. That match could prove pivotal to who finishes fourth this year - and have repercussions beyond.
Given the amount of money City have spent, I can't see anything other than Mancini getting the sack if the club fails to finish in the top four and comes up short in the FA Cup now that they are out of Europe. I don't like saying that, but it seems inevitable.
Understanding
His opposite number, Carlo Ancelotti, was right to take Fernando Torres out of the firing line for a little while by starting him on the bench against FC Copenhagen.
I know I keep saying it but Torres has to click at some stage - his drought can't keep going on; he simply has far too much quality for that to happen.
It's also too early for him to have the same level of understanding as Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka showed midweek as Chelsea reached the quarter-finals of the Champions League for the sixth time in eight seasons - but that will come.
There's no denying that Torres has gone in there at Chelsea and put a few noses out of joint. It's clear to see on the pitch; the strikers are all snatching at their chances and nobody really looks relaxed, which is a real problem.
The owner, Roman Abramovich, has played £50m for Torres, though, and he will want to see that investment out on the pitch so Ancelotti is under pressure to start him on Sunday.
The 0-0 draw against Copenhagen has helped solve that dilemma. If Chelsea had won 4-0 and Drogba and Anelka had got two apiece, it would have been very difficult to slot Torres back in there but he has the opportunity now. Torres has had a good week's training and 20 minutes or so on the pitch, so he should be fit and firing.
If he scores on Sunday and Chelsea win, everything else will be forgiven and forgotten, so it's a big game for him.
Demoralising
Overall, I think Chelsea will be too strong for City at the weekend. They look as though they have got their game back again, whereas City will have to pick themselves up from that demoralising European defeat.
City don't look happy at the moment and their current league form is a concern - they have won only two of their last six games.
But perhaps going to the Bridge will bring the best out of them. They certainly have no reason to fear the champions having won each of their last three league meetings.
It certainly is a game that whets the appetite.
