"Oh Before, He Breaks Away and Scores ... Oh Yaya Toure I Think We Should Pay Him Some More ..." Crystal Palace 1 vs. 2 City

“Now we have another player who can help us this season ... His personality and his quality are there to see ...”, Pep Guardiola – 19/11/2016.

Goals; Wickham (66');Toure (39', 83')



Line Up (4-2-3-1) (match ratings in brackets); 

Bravo (6.5)
Sagna (6.5)
Kompany (6), (Zabalateta (6.5) 37')
Otamendi (6)
Kolorov (6)
Toure (8)
Fernandhino (8.5)
Sterling (6.5)
De Bruyne (6.5)
Nolito (7), (Silva (5.5) 67')
Aguero (6), (Fernando (5.5) 86')


Stats;Possession, 38%/62%; Shots, 9(2)/10(4); Fouls, 12/15
Referee; Robert Madley (4)

In what was probably the worst we have seen of City this season, three football truisms shone out to put a smile back on City fans' faces. No.1 , one-twos inside the area are almost undefendable in the modern game. No.2, packing the box makes it far easier to score a goal. No.3, Yaya Toure still has one of the best footballing brains, if no longer the legs, in a Man City shirt! 

With results and performances for Liverpool and Arsenal, showing its not just the City squad that struggled after an international break made overly long with completely pointless friendlies. City can take solace from this slightly fortunate turn around, having taken 3 points on a Saturday where other title hopefuls have failed, and also managing to rest Gundogan and  Stones for mid-week.

Alan Pardew had certainly got the memo... "Clatter City and push them hard and the ref will do nothing", and this coupled with tired looking performances from a lot of the team, made it look like a long afternoon from the start. In fact it took eighteen minutes to set up the first meaningful chance of the game with Nolito being denied a shot on goal after good work from Sterling down the right. Things then looked to be going from bad to worse, when on 37', Kompany was forced to retire early (seeing double) after taking the worst of a bad collision with Bravo, whilst stopping Puncheon as he ran on goal.

Luckily two of City's oldest and canniest players had not got the message that this was an "off day", and produced a goal of pure class to, temporarily at least, give the fan's reward for their long trip and highly vocal support. Having got away with a certain free-kick just outside the box for a foul on Aguero, Palace gave away the ball as Streling bore down on Kelly, forcing the left back to skew his pass to DeBruyne. Following a quick pass to Yaya and a one two from the Ivorian power house with Aguero, he then linked with Nolito to play another fabulous one two inside the box before crashing the ball into the top left with his right in-step, 1-0, Yaya was back!

After the break it was, unfortunately, much of the same low energy stuff from City as Palace built up a head of steam. This culminated first in a cynical off the ball foul by Puncheon on Zabaleta, blatantly taking out the Argentinian 25 yards from goal as he moved to get onto a De Bruyne pass, ... how he escaped a red, let alone any punishment is beyond me (see the ref score above, unfortunately not a rarity this or any other season).  Then second, the inevitable happened, and City's defence gave way to a quick break; when following an attack, which could have led to an Aguero goal, Palace broke and Connor Wikham made it 1-1 from Saha's pass.

Following this knock back, City finally seemed to muster some steam, and continued to press for a winner, while Palace slowly seemed to be settling for a draw. And then on 83', that man again Yaya Toure, lolloped into the six yard box, apparently unseen by the Palace defence to guide home the winner from two yards out from De Bruynes low corner, 2-1 game-over, and we can all love Yaya again despite his bad staff choices! With him apparently receiving a standing ovation as he entered the dressing room after the game, this is a welcome addition to the squad as we start the descent into Christmas fixture mayhem.

@l0ngwayfr0mh0me