Robbie Keane's 21st goal of the season proved not to be enough as Manchester
City came from behind to snatch a 2-1 victory at Eastlands on Sunday
afternoon.
It looked pretty promising when territorial sway was rewarded by
Keane's arrowed effort that landed high in the net, but two goals out of nothing
in the second half saw us defeated at the City of Manchester Stadium for the
first time. A few minutes in Keane sought to fire the game up by first prodding
to Alan Hutton who, in turn, chipped back into the path of the striker who was
left to battle with Nedum Onuoha before flashing across goal just a little too
far in front of the advancing Aaron Lennon. The passing was slick and
progressive in the opening 15 minutes, mostly from the team in white shirts.
Michael Dawson's flighted throughball got Keane on the chase and he would have
been in had the ball not picked up pace on landing and skidded through to Joe
Hart in the City goal. After the momentum of the game tapering off to a large
degree, Dawson was then in the thick of it in front of our goal. He slid in to
deny Michael Johnson and the ball hit his chest, despite pleas for a penalty
before Elano picked up on the top corner of the area and shot goalwards. Benjani
connected with the shot and helped it on with his head and it took a combination
of Dawson and Paul Robinson to frustrate City. They were further frustrated on
31 minutes when an ambling run down the left from Pascal Chimbonda led to a
stabbed ball through to pick out the angled run of Keane who took a touch before
slamming right-footed past the outstretched hand of Hart. It made it 13 Premier
League goals for the popular marksman. At the other end a magnificent challenge
from Chimbonda and a smart save from Robinson thwarted the attacking intentions
of Johnson and Elano. Lennon then popped a shot wide and then Nery Castillo sped
away towards goal with Chimbonda in hot pursuit, but overcooked his final touch
and Robinson was able to foil. Lennon was replaced at the interval by Tom
Huddlestone, but it was City who came closest to scoring the first goal of the
half when Benjani picked out Castillo in and around the six yard box, but a
combination of defenders and Robbo saw him quickly outnumbered. Huddlestone
tried to put his marker on the game but his effort was gathered by Hart before
City netted a fortunate leveller on 59 minutes. A deep Benjani cross was the
target of a miscue by Castillo but Elano was able to nod towards goal and an
offside-looking Stephen Ireland helped guide past Robinson from a few yards out.
Juande Ramos made a double change bringing on Darren Bent and Jamie O'Hara for
the goalscorer Keane and Malbranque. In truth, the game needed a bit of a
livener from our perspective as it had become laboured and scrappy. A price for
this was paid on 71 minutes when an Elano corner kick was rammed home by the
head of Onuoha. Bent squeezed the ball into the City net with five minutes
remaining but his joy was curtailed by the flag of the assistant, raised for a
reason that was not immediately clear.The toil of extra-time in midweek was
perhaps taking its toll as the game wore on but this will go down as an unlikely
defeat snatched from the jaws of victory.
Linked here.
No comments:
Post a Comment