PEP BACK TO HIS HEAVENLY WAYS
Sublime City put dismay behind them to dismantle Spurs
RUMOURS had spread in the last 10 days that Manchester City had returned to earth. It seems they were exaggerated. Pep Guardiola’s side may have fallen from the heavens with a run of defeats against Liverpool and Manchester United but last night at Wembley, they began to ascend again.
Their 3-1 victory over a fine Spurs side was full of the kind of beautiful, bewitching football we have grown used to over the last eight months and even though Tottenham rallied either side of half time, City were just too good. They have one hand on the Premier League trophy now although we have been saying that since before Christmas.
It has been a formality for a long time. City have been that good. A few critics did their best to forget that over the last ten days but City reminded them of their qualities here. They now need only three more points from their five remaining games to clinch the first title of Guardiola’s reign in England.
Hints of the vulnerability they showed against Liverpool and United resurfaced against Spurs but City banished them quickly enough. In their place, they treated us to the brilliance of Kevin De Bruyne, who ran the game for them again, to the grace and cleverness of David Silva and to the pace and elusiveness of Raheem Sterling.
Most of all, though, just as it has been all season, it was the collective that impressed most for City. It was the teamwork. It was the way they interacted, the way they moved for each other, made space and controlled the ball under pressure. ‘ We’re going to win the League,’ their fans sang in the dying minutes. No one has been of a mind to argue with that sentiment for quite some time.
Still, it has been interesting to see how quickly many have used recent results to attempt to devalue what Guardiola and City have achieved this season.
Maybe it is always that way: when a team has been as dominant as City have been, schadenfreude waits at the end of every defeat, every draw, every minor setback. The reaction to City’s blip has fitted that template. The problem with the glee that has greeted City’s sudden fallibility is that it disregards the fact that Guardiola’s side were still 13 points clear of their nearest challengers going into last night’s game. Sadly for their detractors, it cannot wipe out the memories of some of the sublime football they have played to reach such a commanding position.
Yes, their defeat to Liverpool in the Champions League was a major disappointment and puts City’s wider achievements this season into perspective when they are compared with Manchester United’s Treble-winning season of 1998-99.
Those who anointed City the greatest English side of all time a few months ago were always going to be premature. Greatness is earned over several seasons, not just one campaign. This City side needs to retain the title next season and add European glory to its CV.
If that happens, we can start comparing Guardiola’ s City to Ferguson’s end of century United and the great Liverpool sides of the 70s and 80s.
But it is hard to deny that this has been a special season for City, notwithstanding recent disappointments. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder but many feel they have set new standards for attacking fluidity and creativity. Some of their performances have taken the breath away. All but the most jaundiced critics accept that.
Even City fans have put the setbacks of the past fortnight in perspective. I spoke to one lifelong City supporter who was particularly sanguine about last weekend’s League defeat to United.
‘Look,’ he said, ‘the way United fans were celebrating last week, that was us once. That was us for 20 years. We knew United would win the League so all we had left was trying to beat United in the derby. That’s all United have got now.’
City seemed untouchable again for much of the first half last night. They made a fine side like Spurs look ordinary.
De Bruyne was particularly majestic. He ran the show.
In the first few minutes, he beat two Spurs players without even touching the ball, throwing them out of their stride with two body swerves in quick succession.
Spurs chased shadows. David Silva played a through ball to Sterling, who floated it to the back post. Leroy Sane crashed a volley against
the woodwork with Hugo Lloris motionless. Spurs could barely string two passes together. City were back in masterclass mode. The only surprise was that they went ahead from a long ball pumped out of defence by Vincent Kompany.
Gabriel Jesus ran on to it and drilled it past Lloris. Three minutes later, they were further ahead.
Ilkay Gundogan was the prompt, threading a ball through to Sterling, who was taken out in mid- air by Lloris. The referee awarded a penalty. Gundogan dispatched it with aplomb.
City’s defensive vulnerability was exposed again before half time when Harry Kane sli d a ball through for Eriksen to score via a ricochet. City’s dominance had been such that the Spurs playmaker had barely touched the ball until that point. Now, suddenly, he began orchestrating his team again and the game was a contest.
City took a while to recover their poise but they kept Spurs at bay and midway through the second half Jesus and Sterling missed chances in quick succession.
Sterling also missed a second giltedged opportunity and the ghosts of the last ten days flickered in front of City’s eyes for a while but they are too good to be vulnerable for long and Sterling put the game out of reach with a close- range finish 18 minutes from the end.
The title is very close now. A measure of their might is that they are, once again, 16 points clear of their nearest challengers.
It has, quite simply, been a privilege to watch them. They have set new standards for English domestic football.
The style with which they have played has touched the heavens. It has been a season of dreams.