Christian Pulisic’s goal for Chelsea summed up City’s season of vulnerability when on top but an elite partner for Aymeric Laporte could change fortunes next seasonThey will not fight till the end this time; not even close. Even with Kevin De Bruyne pulling rabbits out of a hat, bending home a magnificent free-kick to give Manchester City hope at the start of the second half, this sublime but fragile side did not have enough to keep going. The race that never was is over with seven games to spare and, for Pep Guardiola, the challenge now is working out how to reel Liverpool in next season.Sorting out that accident-prone defence would be a good place to start. That is the...
Manchester City’s midfield duke was sublime while Arsenal’s David Luiz had a night to forget at the EtihadWelcome back then, English football. Sport in the time of plague: this was never an easy prospect. In the event the Premier League’s live return was jarring, dream-like and lodged at all times on the spectrum between startlingly odd and startlingly everyday Some things were reassuringly the same. Grass remains green. The ball is still round. And Mesut Özil didn’t turn up. Literally so on this occasion: Özil was left out of Arsenal’s matchday squad for the trip to Manchester City. Related: Manchester City return in style as Arsenal pay for David Luiz’s errors Related: Premier League return: five talking points from the...
Winning the Champions League would be an extraordinary act of defiance from a team still waiting to learn if it will be cast out by Uefa and transformed into a sporting ghost shipHas there been a more existentially strange interlude in the history of any modern football club than the drama that could await Manchester City over the next three months?This is a question that may concern only City’s fans for now. It will get lost in the more general weirdness of sporting life in the time of plague. But bear with it, because while the prospect of finishing the football season is a journey without maps for all concerned, what awaits City from here could be both glorious and...
Tottenham and Manchester City are among the clubs who would probably make very different decisions if they could reset the Premier League as if it were Football ManagerThe season must be completed. The season must be abandoned now. As the arguments gabble on, only occasionally acknowledging their own hypothetical nature given how little we know about how the virus will proceed, how long the lockdown may last and whether there may be a second wave of infections when it is lifted, it’s tempting t o dip into another hypothetical. What if this were like a game of Football Manager? What if we could quit without saving and go back and start again last summer? What would Premier League clubs, given...
Pep Guardiola’s side could still win a trophy treble this season but malfunctions in their pressing game are proving costlyTo an extent it doesn’t matter. Manchester City will almost certainly finish second in the Premier League and all defeat to Manchester United did on Sunday was hasten the moment at which Liverpool will be crowned champions. City’s priorities over the next few months lie in the FA Cup, the Champions League and the court of arbitration for sport. But losing to your neighbours three times in a season can never not matter, and there is the wider issue of how City, again, found themselves outmatched by a side that sat deep and countered at pace.It’s not enough to point out...