Manchester City V Tottenham Hotspur

Manchester City 1 - 2 Tottenham Hotspur
9th November 2008
15:00 KO
City Of Manchester Stadium
Attendance 41,853


Pressure is starting to mount the shoulders of Mark Hughes as Manchester City slumped to another premier league defeat in an incident packed afternoon at Eastlands. The underperforming blues have only picked up three points from their last six matches, form which is beginning to unnerve the home faithful and their billionaire owners.

As the final whistle blew all the talk around the terraces was with regards to how long the former Blackburn manager Hughes has left to turn around City’s stuttering season. The loss saw the ambitious blues fall to thirteenth in the table and only a point in front of visitors Spurs who today picked up their first away win of the season under the Harry Redknapp revival.

Hughes dismissed talk of his future being in doubt: "This is a long-term project. The Abu Dhabi United Group understand the team is not going to be challenging immediately for the top four. They are realistic in their aspirations.” That being said it’s difficult to imagine they’d have thought their investment would be struggling this badly after the likes of Shaun Wright-Phillips, Robinho and Jo were added to a team that finished 9th last season.

The game started well for City with Robinho giving them the lead in the 16th minute after a sweeping move which he began by finding Shaun Wright-Phillips who flicked the ball out wide to Darius Vassell. Whose shot was only parried by Keeper Gomes to the grateful Robinho.

Harry Redknapp knows all till well about Robinho after his inspired performance in City’s 6-0 win over Redknapp’s old club Portsmouth last month. He must of hoped his new side weren’t in for more of the same treatment from the Brazilian international.

The blues grew in confidence after scoring with Gomes forced to save at full stretch from Stephen Ireland’s shot to prevent city increasing their lead. The context of the game changed on the 25th minute when Mike Dean gave Gelson Fernandes his second yellow card for a late tackle on Luka Modric.

Tottenham immediately attacked with Joe Hart having to make a smart stop from Modric after he wrong footed Richard Dunne. Moments later Dunne was again at fault slipping while defending a long ball allowing Darren Bent to pounce in between him and on rushing Hart to slot home the equaliser in the Manchester rain.

Hughes felt referee Dean showing three red cards dramatically changed the game: “If the referee had used a little bit of common sense, given the conditions, then it could have stayed 11 v 11. Unfortunately he was not prepared to do that.” Harry Redknapp had the same view: “There were three sending offs but there wasn't a bad tackle in the game."

City became sitting ducks in the second half as Spurs tried to make their extra man advantage count. Despite a spirited performance in particularly from the lively Wright-Phillips, City fell behind. Darren Bent grabbed his second on the 64th minute clinically finishing after drifting away from the City defense.

After taking the lead the Spurs fans taunted the home faithful with the chant of: “Ricky Villa” referring to his mesmerising goal in the 1981 FA Cup final verses City. The determined blues pushed forward going close through Benjani, Robinho and Richard Dunne who was trying to make amends for his earlier error.

The equaliser never came and Richard Dunne’s horror show was completed when he was sent off for a professional foul on Darren Bent in the dying minutes. There was still time for Mike Dean to get his red card out one more time giving Spurs’ Benoit Assou-Ekotto his marching orders for a second bookable offence.

Harry Redknapp was delighted with his side’s victory: “That was important for us today because our recent run has seen us get back amongst the pack.” Where as Mark Hughes took the positives from the defeat: “The qualities we showed will serve us well for the future, the lads showed some real character.”

Although some are questioning how much of a future Hughes has after this defeat. One thing is for certain, results will have to change soon if the Welshman is to remain in the blues hotseat.






Man Of The Match- Shaun Wright-Philips

Despite Darren Bent’s two goals Wright-Phillips ran the show and should have been on the winning side.

Save Of The Match- Heurelho Gomes

Made a diving save to his left to keep Spurs in the game when City were leading 1-0

Facts Of The Match:

Today’s defeat was city’s 1,500th in league football. A milestone Mark Hughes won’t be too proud of achieving.

Tottenham have won 7 of their last 8 encounters with City in league and cup

In their last ten home games Manchester City are on a run of win one, lose one.




Player Ratings

Manchester City Tottenham Hotspur

Joe Hart- 7 Heurelho Gomes- 7
Pablo Zabaleta- 5 Vedran Corluka- 7
Richard Dunne- 3 Jonathon Woodgate- 6
Micah Richards- 6 Ledley King- . 5
Javier Garrido- 6 Benoit Assou-Ekotto- . 4
Shaun Wright-Phillips- 8 Didier Zokora- . 6
Stephen Ireland- 7 Jermaine Jenas- . 6
Gelson Fernandes- 2 Tom Huddlestone- . 7
Darius Vassell- 5 David Bentley- . 7
Robinho- 6 Luka Modric- . 8
Benjani- 7 Darren Bent- . 8

Subs Subs
Didi Hamann- 5 Aaron Lennon- . 4

City unused Subs- Schmeichel, Ben Haim, Onuoha, Elano, Jo, Evans

Spurs unused subs- Sanchez, Hutton, Dawson, O’Hara, Campbell, Pavlyuchenko