Ben Foster: West Brom have a squad that can go far in the Carabao Cup

The Baggies face the daunting task of a Pep Guardiola team on a four-game winning streak that has scored 15 goals and conceded none in its last three fixtures.

Despite the unkind draw in the third round, the players are keen to cause an upset at The Hawthorns.

In recent years, Albion have struggled to get going in this competition, but the squad believe they now have the numbers to progress, and they won’t be giving up their chance of glory easily.

“The Carabao Cup as it's now called – we want a run in that,” confirmed Ben Foster. “We want a run in the cup competitions because we've got the team to deal with it now.

“In previous years it's never been an option, progressing in these competitions took the wind out of you in the Premier League.

“But now we've got 22 real first team players. Anyone of them could be on the pitch on a Saturday afternoon.

“We need to not only do well in the Premier League, we need to have cup run too.”

Tony Pulis is expected to pick a strong side against City tonight. He named a full-strength team against Accrington Stanley in the second round, and Albion’s next game in the league isn’t until Monday night when they travel to Arsenal, giving the players plenty of time to recover.

Foster is hoping to get through the next two rounds of the competition because once you reach the latter stages of a cup, it encourages players to fight for their place even more.

But the Baggies have been knocked out at this stage of the competition in four of the last five seasons.

“The cup run keeps everyone hungry,” he said. “You know you've got to be on your mettle (in the league) because you could lose your place in the League Cup in a couple of weeks’ time.

“You've got to keep going, stay sharp. It's good for everybody really.”