Chelsea midfielder Cesc Fabregas has admitted he was left "surprised" when he saw Manchester City's starting line-up for the club's FA Cup fifth-round tie at Stamford Bridge on Sunday.
City manager Manuel Pellegrini opted to hand debuts to six youngsters for the clash in west London and, despite a strong start from Guus Hiddink's first-choice Chelsea side, the visitors left the home side stunned when 19-year-old David Faupala took just a minute to restore parity after Diego Costa had opened the scoring.
However, Chelsea went on to blow their opposition away, winning the game 5-1 before Pellegrini defended his team selection by saying he was not ready to risk fielding his experienced players with key games against Dynamo Kiev in the Champions League and Liverpool in the Capital One Cup final respectively to come.
Despite Pellegrini hinting last week he was going to rest many of his players, Fabregas admitted he was still surprised to see such a young team taking on Chelsea.
"We played Newcastle last week and three days later played one of the best sides in Europe, Paris Saint-Germain," the Spaniard said.
"I was surprised by City's line-up."
He added to BBC Sport: "I don't know whether this is a positive or a negative... for us it was probably negative because it puts more pressure on us.
"If you lose against this type of team everyone would say you are humiliated."
BBC's Match of the Day pundit Alan Shearer agreed with Fabregas and criticised Pellegrini for not playing a full-strength team on Sunday.
"Barcelona played on Saturday and they face Arsenal in the Champions League on Tuesday," he said.
"It is the same amount of time as City, but they didn't rest any players."
